
Class C \ °t (o 3 

Book iLai 



OopghtN . 



COPVRIGHT DEPOSIT. 



DAN TO BEERSHEBA 



Digitized by the Internet Archive 
in 2011 with funding from 
The Library of Congress 



http://www.archive.org/details/dantobeershebawoOOcolq 



Dan to Beersheba 



Work and Travel 
in Four Continents 



By 

Archibald R. Colquhoun 

Author of "The Mastery of the Pacific," etc. 



NEW YORK 

THE PREMIER PRESS 

1908 






> IwotJooJes Hece 

T 18 >*Ufe 

l ?$Sfi J 



Copyright, 1908, by 

ARCHIBALD E. COLQUHOTJN 

[all eights besebved] 



LC Control Number 




tmp96 025799 



PEINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA BY 
THE PREMIER PBESS, NEW YORK 



To My 
Fellow-Worker and Fellow -Traveller 



" I pity the man who can travel from Dan to 
Beersheba and cry ' 'tis all barren! ' ; and so 
it Is, and so Is all the world to him who will 
not cultivate the fruits it offers."— Sterne. 



DAN TO BEERSHEBA 



CHAPTER I 

MY FATHER GOES TO INDIA 

My great-grandfather, Hugh Colquhoun, lived on a small 
estate called Underwood, near Stirling. He was a prosperous 
man and married into a good mercantile family, his wife being 
Elizabeth Semple. At the time when all Britain was shaking 
with fear of invasion from "Boney," he raised a troop of regu- 
lars for home service, called, in the fashion of the day, "Fen- 
cibles." One of his grandsons afterwards carried on the tea 
business in Glasgow, which was the source of the family for- 
tunes, under the name of Semple and Co. Elizabeth Semple 
was granddaughter of Donald Govan of Cameron and Bon- 
hill, who is reputed to be the original of the old Admiral in 
"Humphrey Clinker." The Smolletts had at one time got pos- 
session of one of the Colquhoun estates, and Donald Govan's 
own place at Bonhill passed into their hands ; so the connec- 
tion between the families was undoubtedly close — more close 
than friendly ! In fact, a feud existed between the Colquhouns 
and the Smolletts to such an extent that my father incurred 
the wrath of the head of the clan on one occasion by voting 
for a Mr. Smollett who was the Conservative candidate for 
Parliament. My father did not agree with Mr. Smollett's poli- 
tics, but declared obstinately that he was the "best man," and 
the best man knew most about India, so he should vote for him ! 
I suspect that he did so very largely to demonstrate his inde- 
pendence of clan ties or the influence of his chief, Sir James, 
for, although the latter was his good friend, my father would 
not brook any idea of the patronage or feudal feeling which is 
the kernel of the clan system. He aggravated his offence by in- 
viting Mr. Smollett to a fine dinner ordered at the local hotel, 

7 



8 DAN TO BEERSHEBA 

and this although he was an ardent Liberal and admirer of 
Gladstone, while Smollett was in the other camp. My father was 
not always so unorthodox in his attitude to the party to which 
he belonged. When the "Governor Eyre" episode happened in 
Jamaica, and although Eyre was a friend of his, he sided with 
the Liberal Government, and quarrelled over the affair with his 
rich aunt, Miss Bathgate. She was so incensed with him that 
at last she wrote, "Don't send me any more of your Radical 
trash ; I will not read it. And don't write to me ; I will return 
your letters." And she cut him out of her will ! 

My father wanted to be a soldier. It was the life to which 
from a baby he had been accustomed, for his first recollections 
were of the barracks at Lichfield and of going to school in 
charge of an orderly. At Underwood he once ran away, fol- 
lowing a passing regiment, and was recovered only after some 
hours by his relatives, who found him, perfectly happy, shar- 
ing the soldiers' meal while they bivouacked by the roadside. 
His character suited him for soldiering, for he was bold and 
careless of danger, quick to come to decisions, determined in 
carrying them out, and, above all, was able to make himself 
obeyed. He was, moreover, extremely popular, although he 
never courted popularity, and both with men and women and in 
all classes he was able to win affection and esteem without 
(to all appearance) giving much in return. In short, he was 
a man of strong character united to a handsome person and con- 
siderable charm. Such a man could not fail to make his mark 
and to attract others without taking much trouble to do so. 

Unfortunately, there was no chance for him to follow his 
natural bent. The only offer that came his way was for a 
nomination in the medical service of the East India Company, 
and the prospects were so good that he could not refuse, even 
though he had no> taste for doctoring. 

The post of assistant surgeon does not suggest much to 
modern ideas, but was considered at the time to be (in the 
words of a delectable handbook published in 1847) "desirable 
both on account of the immediate advantages it offers and the 
prospective benefits with which it is fraught." In 1825, when 
my father went out, the immediate advantages were even 
greater than they were twenty years later, and the qualifications 
still fewer. It was said that "in the old days" a medical officer 
for India "need only sleep one night on a medicine chest" in 



MY FATHER GOES TO INDIA 9 

order to become perfectly qualified. I am quite unable to state 
whether my father prepared himself in this way, but consider 
it more likely that he spent as brief a period as possible at the 
medical college of Edinburgh. Even when he was about to 
leave India, in 1848, the aspirants to the East India Company's 
medical service, where salaries began at £200 to £300, only 
needed a certificate from the Royal College of Surgeons, or a 
diploma from the colleges of Dublin, Edinburgh or Glasgow, 
and a certificate of "having acquired, and being capable of 
practising with proper dexterity, the art of cupping." In prac- 
tical experience six months at a hospital and at least two 
courses of lectures on physics were deemed indispensable before 
they could appear before the Company's examiner. If these 
regulations do not make the mouths of budding general prac- 
titioners water, in these days of severe competitive exams and 
low fees, then I am very much mistaken ! Those of us, how- 
ever, who are more likely to be patients than physicians may 
be thankful that our lot was not cast in India in the first half 
of the nineteeith century, even with every prospect of being 
"cupped" in any emergency with "proper dexterity." 

The India of to-day is very different to that of 1825. There 
were then no hotels, and the newcomer had to depend on the 
kindness to whom he brought letters or to take refuge in board- 
ing-houses. In the days when ships only came in about twice 
a month it was possible, however, to keep open house, and 
the officials of the Company lived with a careless ease and 
lavish hospitality which landed most of them, despite good sal- 
aries and plenty of "opportunities," in quagmires of debt. In- 
terest was at 12 per cent., and with insurance amounted to 16 
per cent. "Interest never sleeps," says the Eastern proverb. 
The salaries were paid monthly, and there was no taxation, so 
that things were made as easy as possible, while pro- 
motion was by rotation, and the only thing necessary 
to earn a higher salary or an eventual pension was 
to live long enough. The health question was, however, a very 
serious one, largely, I imagine, because the English had not 
learnt in any way to accommodate themselves to the climate. 
"The lolling couch, the joys of bottled beer," were still "the 
luxuries they boast them here." I find Stocqueler recommend- 
ing people to take exactly the same meals as in England, and 
the ordinary drink was then Hodgson's pale ale. There is a 



io DAN TO BEERSHEBA 

family legend to the effect that in the Afghan campaign, in 
which he took part, my father found the soldiers suffering 
from the lack of some stimulant, and succeeded in distilling 
from the native grapes a kind of brandy, which was christened 
"Colkie" and was very popular as well as profitable to its in- 
ventor. When I got to India we used to drink Bass or Allsopp 
all day long — a fact which often makes me wonder at my 
own constitution — but a merciful Providence preserved me 
from "Colkie" ! _ 

My father did not join the medical service at once — for 
what reason I do not know — but went to' Burma, where the 
occupation of the coast provinces was just being accomplished. 
There he made the acquaintance of Judson, the American mis- 
sionary, for whom he had a great admiration. Judson had 
made his way to Burma in 1814, and had many difficulties, for 
the East India Company was not favourable to missionaries. In 
1824 he moved from Rangoon to Ava, where he was at first 
well received, but when war broke out he was imprisoned and 
subjected to insults and indignities, being suspected of corre- 
spondence with the English. Later he started work among 
the Karens, translated the Bible and produced his Burmese 
grammar and Pali dictionary, works long out of date, but in- 
volving an immense amount of labour. 

In 1827 my father was in Calcutta, and joined the General 
Hospital on the establishment of the East India Company; 
but the pay was small at this stage, expenses of living were 
high, and his difficulties not few, especially as he desired to 
send some help home to his mother. In July, 1828, he writes 
to his sister Isabella, wife of Colonel Fraser, who was then 
at Bombay: "I am at present receiving only 160 rupees a 
month, and spending more than double that sum." He adds 
a note, which is amusing in view of his own later experiences. 
Speaking of a friend, he says: "I certainly admire his taste 
in marrying a girl of sixteen in preference to an old tabby of 
thirty-five." These were the days when ladies retired into 
matronly caps and middle age at thirty and when girls were 
almost "on the shelf" at twenty two or three ! 

My father's circumstances improved as soon as he got a 
"charge" — that is, a regimental post — and he was able to send 
home sufficient money to buy a house in Carlton Street, Edin- 
burgh, which remained his property, although it was to be his 



MY FATHER GOES TO INDIA n 

mother's residence for life. I shall introduce my readers to 
this house later on. 

When he was about twenty-six, having been seven years in 
India, he fell in love with and married an orphan girl of only 
sixteen. She was the daughter of a Scottish indigo planter 
named Anderson and a Spanish lady, Amora de Rosa, and 
both her parents had died at the ages of twenty-one and twen- 
ty-two, leaving two little children, Felicia and a boy. Their 
father left them a small fortune, about £7,000, and they were 
taken charge of by kind friends and lived up-country, at Mon- 
gyr, with missionaries. When Felicia was fifteen or sixteen 
some ladies who were travelling to Calcutta brought her there, 
and she learnt that her little fortune was lost through the fail- 
ure of a business house in which the trustees had invested it. 
It was at this juncture that she met the handsome young Archi- 
bald Colquhoun, and a very pretty romance hangs over the 
story of the courtship of this young couple. They were married 
in the cathedral at Calcutta, on Christmas Day, 1833, by Bishop 
Heber (of "Greenland's Icy Mountains"). The young couple 
followed the 6th N. I. to Shahjehanpore in Oude, and on Jan- 
uary 17th, 1835, their eldest child, my sister Agnes, was born. 
They were like a couple of children themselves, especially my 
little mother, who had had a very elementary education and had 
seen nothing of the world beyond her early home in the mo- 
fussil and one glimpse of "life" at Calcutta. She played with 
toys and animals long after she was married, and when the 
baby arrived it was just another toy! One day the young 
father stole it away and hid it in the long grass of the com- 
pound, and then told the servants to go and look for missy- 
sahib. The greatest consternation prevailed among the ser- 
vants, who declared the child might have been bitten by a 
snake. 

My mother inherited from her father the shrewd common- 
sense of her Scots ancestors, and this led her to work hard to 
improve herself. Being intelligent, she succeeded in educating 
herself, and became as well-read and accomplished as the aver- 
age girl of the period, so that my father never had cause to 
be ashamed of her lack of training. She wrote a most beau- 
tiful Italian hand, and learnt (after she went home to Scot- 
land) to play on the guitar and sing — accomplishments with 
which she doubtless wanted to surprise her husband when he 



12 DAN TO BEERSHEBA 

came to join her. My own recollection of her is that of sweet- 
ness and tranquillity and of a charity in her judgment not 
always found in our Scottish circles. Her goodness and gen- 
tleness won the hearts of all her husband's relations and 
friends, and she was always served devotedly by her de- 
pendants. 

The dates and places of the births of my sisters and brothers 
show how the family was moved about. Between '35 and '38 
they were at Benares, Allahabad, and Cawnpore, and two 
little boys and a girl were added to the family. Then the 
Afghan campaign was decided on, my father was ordered to 
Ferozepore with the Army of the Indus, and decided that, as 
he could not take my mother and four babies with him, he 
had better send them home. Hitherto he had seen no active 
service, for India had enjoyed peace for twelve years, and as 
this point dates a fresh period in his life I will give it a fresh 
chapter. 



CHAPTER II 

MY MOTHER GOES HOME 

My father, as I said, sent his family home at the beginning 
of this campaign, for wives and children were not allowed to 
accompany the army. Afterwards the troops in garrison in 
Kabul, though not at Kandahar, did send for some of their 
women-folk, but my father must have been glad to think that 
his were safe at home. 

From the pen of my eldest sister Agnes I have an account of 
these years, from her point of view, and a description of her 
journey home for the first time. This domestic narrative 
makes the other side of the picture. On the one hand we have 
the young doctor-soldier going up to Ferozepore and sharing 
in the horrors and triumphs of war ; on the other, the wife and 
babies "going home." This is the ever-present tragedy of 
British life in India, but in those days it was aggravated by the 
difficulty of communication. My mother spent many months 
without news, and after Kandahar was besieged she heard only 
through the public despatches that the garrison was still hold- 
ing out. None of this anxiety — or at least very little — could be 
shared by her little girls, to whom the journey home was the 
most exciting and fascinating experience. Agnes was five, and 
her two little sisters — Janet and Felicia — were three and two, 
while there was a baby boy born at Cawnpore not long before 
the troops and my father were ordered to the front. 

Agnes remembers Cawnpore and our uncle, Sir James Den- 
nis (married to my father's sister), who commanded the Buffs 
and was quartered there at this time. He was in command 
of an infantry brigade of the Army of the Indus at Feroze- 
pore, but on the change of plans and resignation of Fane he 
and his brigade were left in India, to their great disgust. He 
was a widower with one son, James, who was afterwards 
killed in the Crimea, and he was very kind to my mother and 

13 



i 4 DAN TO BEERSHEBA 

her little ones, who loved to go and play round the bandstand 
in his compound, where the band played when he had guests 
for dinner. The Buffs and their colonel were celebrated for 
hospitality. There were usually two bungalows in each of 
these compounds, sometimes connected by long, shady corri- 
dors or verandahs, and these form the principal recollections 
of Anglo-Indian childhood, just as the English child remem- 
bers the gardens where such splendid games were carried on. 
The little girls, followed by their indulgent ayahs, played about 
all day long, while their mother, surrounded by durzees, was 
giving directions for the making of innumerable little gar- 
ments for use on the voyage home, or was superintending the 
inept ayahs and bearers in their packing of huge trunks. 

The journey to Calcutta was, of course, made on the river, 
and a boat called a budgerow, somewhat resembling an Egyp- 
tian dahabeeah, was hired, stored and furnished, and equipped 
with a full complement of servants. The budgerows were 
heavy boats, spoon-shaped below and at stern, with a rough, 
native-carved figure-head in the bows. There were two cabins, 
with Venetian windows to lift up, and a flat roof. Except when 
the breeze was strong enough to fill a heavy sail, they were 
"tracked" by the numerous crew. Agnes and Janet were wild- 
ly excited and pleased with their floating home, and even the 
parting with papa, which left their poor mother so heavy- 
hearted, did not depress their spirits. My mother, like other 
English women, must have needed some courage to undertake 
the journey alone, to a country she had never seen, with four 
babies — she herself a mere girl of twenty-two. 

A few days after they started, she was terribly frightened 
by a fight amongst the servants, who took advantage of the 
absence of any sahib. One of them was nearly killed and 
thrown overboard ; but eventually he was picked up again and 
the boat proceeded on its voyage down the beautiful river. 
Every evening it was anchored alongside the bank, and the 
children could stretch their little legs, while the servants made 
fires and cooked their curry and chupatties. Agnes and Janet 
liked to watch them mixing and baking great piles of these 
thin cakes, which they afterwards seasoned with a little curry 
and devoured in immense quantities. 

One horror of the voyage remains with my sister still. As 
she sat on deck she often saw long, white-shrouded figures 



MY MOTHER GOES HOME 15 

floating solemnly down-stream, and understood from her 
mother that they were "deaders" who were thrown into the 
Ganges to insure that they should float to heaven. One day, 
however, when she was stooping out of one of the cabin win- 
dows, which were nearly level with the water, one of these 
corpses passed right beneath, so that the horrid thing was almost 
touching her. The flesh was half eaten by fishes, and the sud- 
den realisation of the horror of death and the dissolution of 
the body broke upon her childish imagination and gave her 
an unforgettable fright and shock. 

At Calcutta the little family went to the Fort, and stayed a 
few days before sailing in the Indiaman. Here they were 
entertained by connections of my father, Mr. Gideon Colqu- 
houn and his nephew James, both of them rich Calcutta mer- 
chants living in the princely, lavish style common to ''nabobs" 
in those days, but never seen now. These gentlemen, unfortu- 
nately, had business reverses, and only a few years afterwards 
my mother and sisters, who had enjoyed the splendid hospi- 
tality of Mr. James Colquhoun in Calcutta, met his widow 
economising at Boulogne with her children. Such contrasts 
were very typical of Anglo-Indian life of that time. 

On the journey home my mother had a large stern cabin, 
with a bath next it, and was as comfortable as circum- 
stances would allow. The ship was full of officers and their 
wives and the baba log, their pale, spoilt children, with attend- 
ant ayahs. At the Cape they stopped for a week — a delightful 
change for all — and my mother took her little brood to a hotel 
where even the primitive accommodation, accompanied as it 
was by fresh food, seemed luxury after the confinement of the 
ship. Agnes remembers the drive to Constantia to see the vine- 
yards, which was an invariable trip for the tourist. 

London was reached at last, and my poor little mother on 
her first arrival in England was met by one of the handsomest 
and liveliest of her sisters-in-law — Mrs. Dempster — who 
laughed and talked a great deal and made fun of the pale little 
Indian children chattering away in Hindostanee. She made 
fun, too, of the unfashionable clothes manufactured by the 
durzees, and carried my mother off to buy "something decent" 
at the fashionable shops. Agnes was particularly struck with 
baby Hugh, decked out in a huge Leghorn hat with blue ostrich 



i6 DAN TO BEERSHEBA 

feathers. Carried in the arms of a new English nurse, he 
seemed to her a most imposing and fashionable baby. 

Once more the family had to embark on a ship — a dirty 
little boat it looked after the great Indiaman — and on the 
Leith packet they made the journey to Edinburgh, where their 
grandmother lived. 

The picture of this home-coming is very vivid to me, al- 
though it happened before I was born. Grandmama was a 
Scottish lady of the old type — the "young-people-should-be- 
seen-and-not-heard" school. She lived in the house in Carlton 
Street, at the corner of St. Bernard's Square, which my father 
had bought, and everything in that house was symmetrical and 
polished to a degree alarming to eyes accustomed to> the min- 
gled squalor and luxury of Indian life. Grandmama was state- 
ly, tall and handsome, always dressed in black satin, with a 
white tulle ruche round her throat, and with a frilled white 
cap framing her face. Grandmama's household went like 
clockwork, and the introduction of an Anglo-Indian lady and 
her four unruly babies was discomposing, to' say the least of it. 
The first struggle began over deportment. Grandmama sat 
erect on her chair and expected children to do the same. More- 
over, they must not drum on the table with their fingers or kick 
the rungs of the chairs with restless feet. 

Breakfast was served in true Scots style, with a big bowl of 
porridge for each child. None of them had ever seen this food 
and, accustomed to highly-seasoned dishes, curry and rice and 
condiments, they could not summon up appetites for anything 
so plain. The battle of the porridge-bowl waged furiously 
amid the anxious remonstrances of my gentle mother, who 
tried in vain to reconcile the warring elements. Finally, Dr. 
Dempster, a dear, kind, old military doctor uncle, who was 
stationed at the castle with his regiment, was called in and pro- 
nounced that it was not good for children to be forced to eat 
what they didn't like. In subsequent days I often wished Dr. 
Dempster could have come to my rescue as he did to that of 
my sisters. 

Grandmama's house looked out on a square where there 
were big trees and a rookery. The children were delighted 
with this colony of birds, and loved to hear the eternal caw- 
cawing and to see the rooks holding conferences. One day 
they looked out of the window and called out that beautiful 



MY MOTHER GOES HOME 17 

white feathers were falling from the sky. It was their first 
sight of snow. 

The winter in Edinburgh — a severe trial to the Anglo-In- 
dian family — was enlivened by the presence of uncles, aunts 
and cousins, and especially the Frasers and Marrs. Archie 
and Jane Fraser, who were about the same age as my elder 
sisters, were great friends and playmates, and in after years, 
when Archie went to Australia, he kept up a correspondence 
with Janet and cherished her letters until his death. This early 
friendship, begun before I was born, was recalled to me a few 
years ago when Archie Fraser's beautiful daughters, now mar- 
ried women, came over to England for the first time and told 
me how their father had always talked of his dear cousin 
Janet. Janet died in India in 1875. 

My mother and her children spent the summer of 1840 and 
the following summers at Riddrie. The winters were passed 
at Edinburgh, where they took a furnished house. The little 
Anglo-Indians were not bothered with lessons, but allowed to 
run wild in the garden at Riddrie, and grew round and rosy- 
cheeked and lost their Indian pallor and languid ways. 

One night, when the little girls were tucked up in bed, they 
were awakened by a great noise of laughter and talking, and 
someone came with great strides up the nursery stairs and 
picked them out of bed and kissed and hugged them. And it 
was papa home from the war ! It was nearly five years since 
they had seen papa, and he had grown to be almost a shadow 
in the children's minds. Now he burst upon them as something 
new and delightful — a big, handsome, indulgent papa, who 
was always laughing and singing and playing on the flute, 
and who let them play with his beautiful sword and told them 
wonderful stories about the Afghan war. 

After a short stay in Scotland he decided to carry my 
mother off to see something of the continent of Europe, and 
accordingly the little folks were placed at a home school at 
Stirling. This was a lovely old-fashioned house and garden 
at the foot of the Castle, and only a few children were taken. 
Education was elementary, and the gentle ladies who kept 
the school left little impression on Agnes, save that they took 
her and Janet to church on Sundays and (what was far more 
interesting) read Bunyan's "Pilgrim's Progress" to them in 



18 DAN TO BEERSHEBA 

the evenings. Near Stirling lived relatives, the Sconces, whose 
hospitable house stood close to the racecourse. 

After their Continental trip my father and mother returned 
to London, where my sister Helen was born ; and as soon as 
she was old enough to travel they went to 1 Scotland and chose 
a good school for their elder children before returning to India. 
It seemed to my father that the time had come when Misses 
Agnes and Janet, now big and handsome girls — Agnes was a 
real beauty — ought to be turned into young ladies and given 
a polite education. The school selected was the Misses H.'s 
of Glasgow, both then and later a fashionable seminary. 

While their children were absorbed in their own little griefs 
and pleasures the parents were going through a most trying 
time. They got back to India in January, 1845, an d almost 
immediately the Sikh war broke out, and the 43rd, which my 
father had rejoined, went once more to the front. With this 
regiment and with the 23rd he was through several engage- 
ments. At Ferozeshah the Sikhs were attacking, and here the 
heroic George Broadfoot was killed. My father's horse was 
shot under him, and he lost a button off his tunic and had a 
bullet through his helmet; but then, as ever, he escaped with- 
out a wound, being said by his comrades to bear a charmed 
life. Victory wavered from one side to another, and the vic- 
tors lost one-seventh of their numbers and were too exhausted 
to prevent the Sikhs from crossing the Sutlej and preparing 
for fresh operations. It was a critical moment in Indian his- 
tory. The victory of Aliwal followed, and then, on February 
10, Sobraon. 

My mother and her little girl went up with my father, and 
with Lady Sale and other women and children were placed 
in a fort during the engagements. The 43rd was one of the 
four regiments that opened the attack at Sobraon, which was 
said by Sir Herbert Edwardes to be by far the finest attack 
of the whole campaign. The Sikhs fought desperately; not 
one surrendered or asked for quarter. Inside the fort the suf- 
ferings were great. The army was short both of food and 
water. It was very cold at night, and the moans and shrieks 
of the wounded and dying who were brought in to be attended 
to added to the horror. To complete my mother's sufferings, 
her little girl, Helen, developed whooping-cough, of which she 
died. 



MY MOTHER GOES HOME 19 

It was in this campaign that my father made the acquaint- 
ance of Napier (afterwards Lord Napier of Magdala), to 
whom reference is made elsewhere, and of Loch (later Lord 
Loch), then about seventeen years of age and a cornet in a 
Bengal cavalry regiment, acting as A.D.C. to Gough. Forty- 
five years later, when Administrator of Mashonaland, I served 
under Loch, then High Commissioner in South Africa. 

When the first Sikh campaign ended, my parents went to 
Simla, thinking the climate might help to restore my father's 
health, for he was suffering very much from rheumatism ; but 
it soon became apparent that he could not go on service again, 
although still a young man — only forty years of age — and 
much as he desired to stay on a few more months in order to 
earn the special pension to which he would have been entitled 
after twenty years' service, he was obliged to resign in 1847, 
after nineteen years' service, and accompanied my mother 
home. Had he served three years more he would probably 
have become Surgeon-General, for there were only two men 
senior to him and both retired. This would have meant a 
very fine pension. 

On the way home I made my appearance, in a violent storm, 
when the ship — the Alfred — was off the Cape of Good Hope. 
This was in the year of revolution — the fateful '48. On 
arrival, my father tried the waters at Bath, and then at various 
Continental spas, and for two or three years the family moved 
about with him. When his health was somewhat restored he 
began to go up to London a good deal. He had brought back 
a considerable sum from his Indian service, and was induced, 
like so many retired veterans, to dabble in speculation. He 
became acquainted with a company promoter whom we will 
call Jim Courtney, a well-known man in his day, having made 
a large fortune. By his advice my father invested practically 
his whole fortune in indigo shares, then a very paying affair. 
Shortly after, Mr. Courtney — who had acted as his broker — 
frightened my father by declaring that the bottom had dropped 
out of indigo, and that he must sell out at once; and out of 
"friendship," as it was he who had recommended the invest- 
ment, he took my father's shares off his hands at a "dead loss" 
— so he said. Strange to relate, indigo shortly after took a 
change for the better, and my father descended upon his 
"friend" with great wrath. All the people who knew him in 



20 DAN TO BEERSHEBA 

his prime agree that my father in a rage was not a person to 
be trifled with. 

The rest of my father's life was passed at Glasgow, Helens- 
burgh, and (the last twenty years) in Edinburgh. He drew 
his pension for forty-two years, and was wont to say he was 
"one of the Company's bad bargains." 

Before closing this chapter, in which my father is the hero, 
although the narrative may ramble away from him sometimes, 
I must take my readers into my confidence as to the material 
from which I have had to reconstruct his personal adventures. 
I have said he was reticent as to himself, and he was, more- 
over, as averse to putting pen to paper as is his son; for I 
must confess that without an amanuensis neither I nor my 
typewriter would be able to earn a living. She, poor lady! 
would be worried into an early grave by the hieroglyphics 
which I should with infinite exertion spread over many half- 
sheets of note-paper. My father had the same preference for 
this form of memorandum — now sanctioned by the highest 
political authority — and I have by me at this moment a collec- 
tion of half-sheets scrawled over in pencil. At some period of 
his later life he was evidently inspired with the idea that some 
record of his early adventures would be appreciated by his 
descendants, or he meant to comply with the reiterated request 
of his friends to write down some of his experiences. The 
intention was never realised, but the notes remain. Some peo- 
ple have the art of making notes at once brief and graphic. 
Some have not. 

The reader shall judge some of these for himself. 

Burma — Tiger — Moulmein — Pirates — Woongyee's daugh- 
ter — Snakes — Balachoung — Denny's dead horse — Judson — - 
Wilson stabbed — Adventure — Packed off — Fire in ship — Go to 
hell — Duel — Cholera — Sale of clothes — Mutiny — Sail for Pe- 
nang — Ship's distress — Cupmate — Agar's mutiny — Sir R. Ar • 
buthnot — Free Kirk Dalrymple — "Cholera Sam." 

From these and other notes, largely supplemented by memo- 
ries of old stories told by him now and then, and still more by 
his friends, I know that my father was in Burma in 1826, 
where he seems to have had a lively time, at Moulmein, Penang 
and elsewhere, with the Woongyee's daughter, mutinies, stab- 
bings, a duel, snakes, and other incidents. On one occasion I 
know he fell ill of cholera and was believed to be dead, and the 



MY MOTHER GOES HOME 21 

news being sent to the place where he had left his effects, they 
were promptly sold, so that when he turned up he found every- 
thing gone. It was then, apparently, that he took boat for 
Penang and had an adventurous voyage, but we are left to 
conjecture who went to a place unmentionable in polite society. 

The following must be read in the light of my description of 
field ambulance work in the Afghan War: — "Amputating 
scenes — Deaths — Tent work — After Ferozeshah — Ghilzie — Ef- 
fects of poojah (holiday-making) on apoplexy and cholera — 
Denny Mit. pills No. 43 — Walker and I — No medicine — Wom- 
an shot through body — Girl shot at Ghirishk — Chief in neck — 
W. between camels — Sunday wax candles — Let down tent — 
Dr. Fleming — Short food — Mrs. Manning — Round Kabul — 
Loss of shawl — Ensign shoots men outside gate — Jail Kanda- 
har — Blowing off chief (see p. 36) — Four men princes murder 
Europeans ; wonder not all — Tortures of princes — Seat at gate 
— Justice — Courage of servants and dhooly bearers — Battle of 
Gwynne — Skirmish that morning — Sales of officers' effects — 
Death scenes — Worsley, Dr. Barnby, Hart, Dr. Jacob Walker 
— Blond man, law of compensation." 

The whole of this, when once deciphered, was perfectly in- 
telligible, except the last sentence, where my father, contrary 
to his wont, was apparently indulging in philosophical reflec- 
tions. What were the compensations of a blond man? This 
is the sort of historic puzzle that should attract Mr. Andrew 
Lang, but I make a present of it to anyone who cares to try ! 



CHAPTER III 

MY BOYHOOD 

Like my sister, some of my earliest recollections hover round 
the island of Arran, where we were often taken in the sum- 
mer; but, unlike hers, my memory has a touch of bitterness. 
I think it must be characteristic of some children that they are 
most struck with the injustice and disappointments of life. 

There was a postman at Arran, one of those long-bearded, 
soft-spoken Highlanders who charmed us little "leddies and 
gentlemen" with his deferential ways and flattering remarks. 
I used to go out to meet him every morning, hanging around 
till he came in sight, for he had promised me that one day he 
would bring me a "bonnie wee boat" for my very own. Oh, 
that boat! Never was such a beauty for swiftness, and the 
white sails of her and the green paint and the wee seats and 
the anchor and a' ! With such descriptions the old man be- 
guiled me of my weekly penny for many weeks — it was to help 
beautify the boat. I don't know when, where, or how it 
dawned on me that I was being fooled — that there was not, 
and never would be, any boat ! Up to the last day of our stay 
in Arran I believed in my friend and his promise, and was 
dragged away in tears, thinking that one more day and the 
boat — the bonnie wee boat — would have been mine. 

Some years afterwards, in the dawning worldly wisdom of 
ten years or so, I suddenly realised his treachery, and my 
heart is black to-day even at the thought of him. Nothing in 
my whole life has made such a lasting impression on me as 
this childish incident, or has caused me a tenth part of the suf- 
fering which I endured over it. For one thing, I was a lonely 
child. My elder brothers and sisters were at school; there 
were about nine years between me and the younger ones, Flor- 
ence and Gideon, who were born after my father's return from 
Australia. No doubt, I thought them mere babies — at any 



MY BOYHOOD 23 

rate, they could not share in my joys and sorrows. I have 
felt the pangs of disappoinment since — deferred promotion, 
foiled ambition — but nothing — nothing — has hurt like the 
treachery of the Arran postman and his phantom boat ! 

My other vivid recollection is of a river, with men salmon- 
fishing, with whom I made friends. This was the river Doon, 
in Ayrshire, in the Burns country, where we had a house for 
some time. My fishermen friends gave me my first smoke, 
and I remember the consequences and the physical prostra- 
tion that followed, and my flight for consolation to a kindly 
cook. 

There is an anecdote of me at the age of nine or ten which 
shows what a cheeky little chap I was. My sisters were going 
out to some evening or late afternoon entertainment, and the 
question of escort was mooted. I interposed loftily, "All right, 
girls ; I'll take you ! Pull down your veils, and I'll keep the 
rogues off!" As for my school life, I only recollect that I 
learnt nothing at all either at the Glasgow academy or at the 
Helensburgh school. I suppose it was my appalling ignorance 
and apathy which induced my father to send me to Neuwied 
on the Rhine — the school of the Moravian Fathers. He had 
his eye on a commercial life for me, and probably wished me 
to learn a modern language. 

Neuwied in my time was a big school, with very few Eng- 
lish boys in it, and the director was a little man with a huge 
head, called Von Biilow, whom we all feared but respected. 
From what I remember of myself, I had an antipathy to doing 
anything expected of me which amounted to a mania. I don't 
think it was really natural to any child, but probably resulted 
from my father's theories of education applied to a boy with 
more than the average amount of obstinacy. I was on the de- 
fensive all the time, and my career at Neuwied might have 
developed, as at my previous schools, into an absolute struggle 
against being taught anything but for the intervention of a 
man who had the precious gift of insight. From the passionate 
devotion with which I afterwards regarded him T conclude that 
no one else had ever taken the trouble to understand me. I 
admired Von Stein, to begin with, because he had fought a 
duel and (it was whispered) had killed his man. On one occa- 
sion, when I was to have received a well-merited punishment, 
Von Stein called me to him and spoke as man to man. He 



24 DAN TO BEERSHEBA 

told me how insubordination had wrecked his own life, and 
then, appealing to my pride, asked how I could bear to see 
the younger boys beating me in tasks which I could well do if 
I put my mind to it. In the American phrase, this got right- 
home. I owe Von Stein a great deal. 

Of course, lessons were all in German, and I became quite 
proficient in that language, and got a very sound education 
generally of the commercial sort — no classics. I had been la- 
bouring at Latin at the academy, but all that slipped away, and 
at the present moment I know about as much of the great lan- 
guages of Greece and Rome as did Shakespeare ! 

I stayed about two and a half years at Neuwied and then 
came home and was "at a loose end" for a time, after which 
Uncle Archy's office, once the open sesame of delight to my 
sisters, yawned to receive me, an unwilling victim, into its 
dark and dusty rooms. I spent as little time there as I pos- 
sibly could. I was still the bookworm that had fed on "Bur- 
ton's Anatomy" in Uncle Archy's library, and now all my 
spare cash was spent on books and magazines which, I am 
afraid, often went into the office and absorbed me a good 
deal more than Uncle Archy's folios. 

I really do not see how my father could have expected me 
to settle down in a Glasgow office. From my early years I 
had heard nothing but India — India — India. My baby ears 
had been filled with stories of war ; my eldest sisters talked 
incessantly about the strange scenes of their earliest days 
(much of which they knew by hearsay only) ; and as I grew 
older and learned to be a "little pitcher" I listened to my 
father and his friends yarning away about adventures which 
made life in Scotland too tame for words. 

Never shall I forget the breathless interest with which I 
heard the story of Vincent Eyre's relief of the "Little House 
of Arrah," where a tiny garrison held out against great odds 
and were at their last gasp when Eyre, on his own initiative, 
reached them by a forced march in the very nick of time. The 
hero of this exploit was well known to my father. 

Then I heard such names as Rawlinson, Broadfoot, Christie, 
Pottinger, Skinner and Gardner, and their stories, which I 
have since read in a more coherent form. I heard them in 
the shape of legends and sagas of heroic character — enough 
to fire the imagination of any boy. Rawlinson was one of 



MY BOYHOOD 25 

my best-known heroes, and a real — not a mythical — figure, as 
he came to visit my father, having been in Kandahar, as noted 
already, during the two and a half years spent there. He went 
out to India a year before my father, at the age of seventeen, 
and at twenty- three was organising armies in Persia. On one oc- 
casion he did a wonderful ride, which must, I think, be a 
record for such achievements, comparing favourably even with 
Sir Harry Smith's exploit and that of the colonist Dick King, 
who rode through a country infested with hostile natives to 
bring help from Grahamstown to Durban. Rawlinson's ride 
was from Teheran to the Persian camp near Herat, 750 miles, 
which he did in seven days, and after a short time there he 
rode back again, doing the distance in 150 hours, or at a rate 
of five mlies an hour for six consecutive days. 

Eldred Pottinger, whom my father first met in Kabul, when 
he and the other prisoners and hostages were brought in from 
their long captivity, had a history which is truly remarkable 
when we remember that he was only thirty-three at the time 
of his death. He was a few years younger than my father, 
and went out to an uncle who held high office in Sind when 
he was a mere boy. From this relative he got permission to 
embark on a most perilous mission in Afghanistan to gather 
information, and this he accomplished, travelling to Kabul 
and Herat via Peshawar in various disguises The extraor- 
dinary facility with which Pottinger and other men at this 
time learnt native dialects, and travelled as natives through 
most hostile country, is always a marvel to me At Herat, Pot- 
tinger found the Persians, accompanied by Russian officers, be- 
sieging that city, so he threw off his disguise and offered his help 
in the defence. He was so useful and successful that he acquired 
great prestige with the Afghans, and was ultimately appointed 
political agent in Herat. Pottinger could so thoroughly as- 
sume the habit and bearing of an Afghan that when he went 
by command to meet Lord Auckland on the frontier, and was 
invited to dinner, he was nearly chucked out of the mess-tent 
by the officers assembled there, who resented the uninvited 
presence of a "native" ! 

Another Indian hero whose name was familiar to me on my 
father's lips, though I do not know where and how they be- 
came acquainted, was Colonel James Gardner, a member of 
a well-known Irish family. At the age of thirteen family in- 



26 DAN TO BEERSHEBA 

fluence had procured him an ensigncy in the King's service — 
an honour which, of course, carried with it no obligation to 
serve. With the termination of the American War, and the 
reduction of the military establishment, James was placed on 
half -pay before he was fourteen. In 1789 he was on the active 
list, and in 1794, at the age of twenty-four, he was retired once 
more as a captain on half-pay. The exact year in which he 
went out to India cannot be traced, but by the beginning of the 
nineteenth century we find him in the army of the Mahrattas 
and in the service of Holkar. He had married a native 
princess, one of the family of the independent princes of Cam- 
bay, who first saw him when he was sent by Holkar on a mis- 
sion to her father. Of course he did not see her face, but 
caught a glimpse of dark eyes behind the lattice in the audi- 
ence-chamber Probably the girls of the zenana had been al- 
lowed to have a peep at the strange sight of a Feringhee sol- 
dier, and in any case the electric spark from the two pairs of 
eyes was enough to light a conflagration in two hearts. Gard- 
ner afterwards declared that he made up his mind then and 
there to wed those eyes or none, and the lady was equally 
attracted, so that, despite the manv difficulties in the way, 
their marriage was at length allowed. Years after, Gardner 
said, with some pathos, to a lady who was trying to arrange 
a match for one of his daughters, that he could not advise 
any Englishman to marry a native lady, and this although he 
was always a devoted husband and his wife so deeply attached 
to him that she only survived him a few months 

I have been drawn away by these old Indian tales from the 
story of my boyhood, just as I was drawn away then from 
my office stool. I stood the office as long as I could — about 
two years — and then one day I ran away. I went to Edin- 
burgh and there took a boat — a cattle-boat, I think — from 
Leith to Hamburg. My sisters had given me a little money, 
but I had precious little, and I started out to see Europe with 
only a few shillings in my pocket. I had a companion, another 
boy from the office, and together we walked and walked and 
walked. I can hardly remember now where we went, it was 
all so bewilderingly new. I know we walked through the 
Black Forest, and slept at peasants' huts, and drank milk and 
ate black bread. I know we were in Prague, in Innsbruck ; that 
we saw the Italian lakes, and then came by Lake Constance 



MY BOYHOOD 27 

and down the Rhine, and found ourselves one day at Antwerp. 
We carried our worldly goods in knapsacks, and my knowledge 
of German enabled us to pass as burschen — wandering appren- 
tices on the tramp. We ate with the families at inns or in the 
peasants' huts, and a few groschen paid for our suppers and 
rough beds. When I read that finest of all novels, 'The Clois- 
ter and the Hearth," in later life, it carried me back to this 
Wanderjahr — to the joys and perils of the road, the smell of 
the earth, and the deep shade of forest paths. I had remit- 
tances from time to time from my sisters, but no communica- 
tion from my angry father. At last I heard that Janet, now 
married and in India, had asked that I should be sent out to 
her, confident that something could be got for me to do. This 
was the only bait that could have brought me back within 
reach of parental authority. Even now, however, I was not 
to go to Scotland to see my father. I went to London. Here 
I heard that a police appointment in the North-West Prov- 
inces would be open for me. I believe this was the usual 
refuge where parents sent their black sheep. I know I was 
a very black sheep, indeed, and with others of my kind, and 
a very scanty outfit. I was shipped off to India. My brother-in- 
law, Andrew Symington, Felicia's husband, came up to town to 
see me off and took my passage, and one or two family friends 
were kind to me and gave me tips and w r ords of encourage- 
ment, but I departed to seek my fortune in India with a very 
strong impression that I had burnt my boats in Scotland, and 
that my father would not be reconciled to me until I had 
proved myself something better than the idle, insubordinate 
youngster he deemed me. It was sink or swim for me now. 

Once I got to India I was the black sheep no longer, which 
was a very good thing, for I was not the sort of boy to thrive 
on admonitions. Friends and relations welcomed me; no one 
seemed to think I ought to have stuck in "that beastly office," 
and I had a "rattling good time." It was only in later years 
that I realised how badly I had behaved to kind Uncle Archy, 
and from a feeling of false shame I never could write to tell 
him of my regret. I never saw him again, and, though he for- 
gave me shortly before his death, I know my conduct must 
have wounded him. I had been regarded as his probable heir, 
and it was partly this that kept me tongue-tied — I was afraid 
he would think I wanted his forgiveness for that! 



28 DAN TO BEERSHEBA 

I did not return to Scotland for twelve years, in which time 
I had carved out a career of promise for myself and was on 
the full tide of prosperity. My father was proud of me, my 
stepmother became my devoted friend, and the black sheep 
was washed white ! 



CHAPTER IV 

I GO TO INDIA 

Needless to say, I went to India by the Cape — the expen- 
sive "Overland" was not for youngsters with a plentiful lack 
of everything except time and health. When we passed my 
birthplace, off the Cape of Good Hope, we had an even worse 
storm than that which ushered me into the world. One of 
our masts was carried away, and I believe we were in some 
peril. On this voyage I discovered myself to be an excellent 
sailor, and from that time to this have never been inconven- 
ienced even by the roughest weather and under the most un- 
comfortable conditions. I spent a good deal of time yarning 
with the sail-maker, a picturesque figure no longer familiar in 
ocean travel. He sat in his own little corner in the bows all 
day long, stitching away with a huge needle at the sails, his 
hand protected by a leathern shield, and his eyes by a pair of 
horn spectacles. The sail-maker on a boat plays a special part 
in old-fashioned sea-stories — is a bit of a character, a philoso- 
pher, picking up odd scraps of learning from desultory reading 
and from his chats with passengers. My friend on the City 
of Calcutta was a good type of his vanishing race. The car- 
penter was another old salt of the kind we find in Marryat's 
tales. I was relieved to find that the discipline maintained by 
the captain, in the teeth of some little trouble from such sea- 
lawyers as there were on board, was kept up by moral suasion, 
and not by loaded pistols and irons, as in my father's experi- 
ence. 

No special excitement varied our long, dull passage, and I 
was glad enough when, after a voyage of four months without 
a single break or a sight of land, we at last reached Calcutta. 
Here I was at once with friends, and, as I said before, my 
sensation of "black sheepdom" vanished before the warmth 
and kindliness of my welcome. My first stay of any length 

29 



30 DAN TO BEERSHEBA 

was arranged to give me an idea of life in the Mofussil. India 
was divided then, for its English residents, into Presi- 
dency towns, stations and Mofussil, the last being "up- 
country." Each Presidency town was a little metrop- 
olis and looked down on the big "stations" — places like 
Allahabad, Meerut, or Bareilly — while these, in their turn, 
pitied the benighted denizens of the Mofussil. Personally, both 
then and now, in Africa, Australia, or other continents which 
my countrymen have colonised, I prefer the "veld" and 
the "bush" or the Mofussil to the imitation towns which 
grow up with most of the disadvantages and few of 
the attractions of city life in Europe. My first acquaintance 
with the Mofussil was, however, made under peculiarly at- 
tractive circumstances. I went to stay on a large indigo estate 
in Behar, indigo being still the source of princely incomes. 
After my youth and bringing up in the school of modest econo- 
mies usual in our Scottish circles, where Riddrie Park, with 
its graceful and generous but not lavish hospitality, had seemed 
the height of luxury, I was astonished at the atmosphere in 
which I found myself. There was a great low bungalow full of 
rooms, and surrounded by a huge verandah supported on white 
pillars. Cane chairs and tables lined the verandah, and the 
rooms, which were all enormous and painted white, had the 
simplest of furniture and bare floors with mats. But troops 
of servants waited on one's lightest whim, and guests came 
in and out as they wished. Horses and carriages were at their 
disposal, and meals of the most lavish character were served 
in the dining-hall, at which, it seemed to me, an indefinite num- 
ber of men appeared and were accepted as guests, even if they 
only arrived a few minutes before dinner-time. I think this 
easy-going hospitality, which was carried to an excess at this 
time in India, was the thing most likely to strike a newcomer 
from a thrifty Scots home, where an invitation to eat and 
drink was a serious matter conveyed some days beforehand. 
The extravagance and waste in an Indian household, especially 
in one like that I am describing, where there were no ladies, 
would have appalled my Scottish relations. And with all its 
charms, I am bound to say that the system was a bad one, and 
that it landed many of those who practised it in debt, while 
the style of living was far too good and led to over eating and 
drinking, and consequently impaired digestions and livers. The 



I GO TO INDIA 31 

plantation itself was not specially attractive, consisting of a 
vast estate dotted over with little villages, and presenting the 
appearance of a huge treeless plain cut only by irrigation 
ditches. 

After this sudden plunge into Oriental luxury — which is not 
comfort — I went to my cousins the Irvings at Allahabad and 
saw "station life." Dr. Irving was then the civil surgeon — he 
afterwards became surgeon-general — and his house was a most 
hospitable one. Here I emerged from the freedom of the non- 
official Mofussil into the genuine Anglo-Indian station atmos- 
phere, with its many social gradations, its sharp division into 
"civilian and military," its personal gossip, the ever-present 
question of "promotion," and the under-current of pathos in 
the yearning after home and the anxious waiting for news 
from loved ones in the old country. A good deal of all this 
undoubtedly survives to this day, but a great difference exists 
in the tone of Anglo-Indian society now from the time at which 
I first made acquaintance with it. This is for the most part 
due to the far easier intercourse with the old country and the 
extent to which people move to and fro, coming home con- 
tinually and being frequently — too frequently, perhaps — visited 
by streams of friends and acquaintances. 

At Meerut I joined my sister Janet and her husband, Cap- 
tain Court, and here I came to a critical point in my career, as 
I had to decide what to do. The police appointment which 
was my ostensible goal did not seem good enough to my sister, 
who had greater ambitions for me, so it was decided I should 
go to Roorkee and try for an appointment in the Public Works 
Department. Roorkee is a Government college, founded 
through the efforts of a Royal Engineer officer, Thomasson, 
who thought a training college for Anglo-Indian boys would 
provide a valuable nucleus for the many public works then 
being undertaken in India, and would also be a relief for the 
men who could not afford to send all their boys home. Here, 
too, Indians were trained as surveyors, but in my time the 
engineering branch was entirely reserved for Anglo-Indians. 
Among my classmates were several men who have since risen 
to some distinction in the engineering world, especially Sir 
W. Willcocks, so well known for his irrigation work in Egypt. 
With the exception of Mr. (afterwards Sir John) Elliott, the 
professor of mathematics, all our teachers were Royal Engi- 



32 DAN TO BEERSHEBA 

neers, and the principal was Colonel Medley, R.E. Elliott was 
extremely popular, and was a delightful companion — gentle, 
cultivated and thoughtful. He afterwards became head of the 
Meteorological Department in India and brought that service 
to a very high pitch of efficiency. All the officers treated us 
young fellows with great kindness and camaraderie, joined in 
our games, and took great interest in our training. Inci- 
dentally I may mention that the first gymkhana held in India 
or anywhere else (under that name) took place at Roorkee in 
i860. The word is a hybrid of some kind, but even the erudi- 
tion of Sir Henry Yule was baffled by it. 

Altogether, the two years I spent at Roorkee were extremely 
pleasant as well as profitable. We did a great deal of prac- 
tical and field work, at which I was always better than at books. 
I never was any good at examinations, and rejoice that I did 
not have to compete in the present era, when the examiners' 
main idea seems to be to find out what the wretched candidate 
does not know — not what he does ! I should have been 
ploughed hopelessly again and again. If I ever have a night- 
mare, it usually takes this form — that I have to go in for an 
examination, and I suffer agony at the absolute blankness of 
my mind on every subject! As it was, however, after a little 
reading with a clergyman at Mussouree I was able to pass 
into Roorkee, and at the end of two years I passed out cred- 
itably and got a post as assistant engineer in Burma, my first 
station being Tenasserim. The education at Roorkee was 
practically free, and living was very cheap. We all lived in 
small bungalows, two in each, and messed together. My sister 
helped me with the necessary expenses, but I think few men 
got their professional education cheaper than I did. The one 
thing in which I found myself at a disadvantage was games, 
for we had played no games at Neuwied. Therefore I could 
not compete on even terms with my comrades in cricket and 
football, and, as I hated doing anything badly, I did not join 
in these games more than I could help. I had never learnt to 
dance, either, and at a later date I found this a social disad- 
vantage, but was too stiff and proud to remedy the deficiency. 
I believe I was extremely sensitive, self-conscious, and rather 
shy; at any rate, I was never a favourite in society and did 
not care for it. 

From Roorkee I paid visits to Delhi and Agra, and at the 



I GO TO INDIA 33 

former was entertained by Major de Kantzow, of Kantzow's 
Horse, who lived by himself in the city. He was one of the 
survivors of the Mutiny, and a story was told of him that, 
being taken prisoner and led out to be shot, he asked for time 
to finish his cheroot, and so impressed his captors with his fear- 
lessness that they gave him his life. 

I was, however, fond of sport, and whenever we had a day 
to spare went off shooting wild fowl on the upper reaches of 
the Ganges, and peacock and deer in the dense forests at the 
foot of the Himalayas. In this neighbourhood there were vil- 
lages with temples and shrines dedicated to the goddess who 
protects monkeys, and the surrounding groves were full of 
her chattering votaries, who were bold with their own im- 
munity and used to throw down cocoanuts on our heads. On 
one occasion one of our party, ignorant of their sacred char- 
acter, shot one of these monkeys, and brought the village like 
a swarm of locusts round us. For my part, I could never shoot 
a monkey, however annoying it might be — it is too human in 
its death agony. I went out tiger-shooting once or twice, but, 
of course, it was too expensive an amusement for us young- 
sters, as a rule. My principal recollection of it at this period 
is the extensive and elaborate organization of the campaign 
against one animal. Armies of beaters, corps of shikaris, and 
herds of elephants were marched forth, and my part, as it 
seemed to me, was merely to sit in the fork of a very uncom- 
fortable tree and wonder what on earth I should do if the great 
man-eater, then crashing about in the jungle not far off, should 
actually appear and make for me. I was not sure I could fire 
without falling off my perch, and I was not genuinely sorry 
that the tiger avoided me. I feel that this "tiger story" is far 
from orthodox, but it has at least the merit of truthfulness. 

During some of my holidays I joined my sister and brother- 
in-law in several camping expeditions. He was, I think, de- 
tailed for political work, and travelled about visiting some of 
the native States. The pageant of Indian life unfolded itself 
before me in these journeys, which were made with Oriental 
leisureliness and luxury. We had a regular cavalcade of camp- 
followers, and our tents, with furniture, books, carpets and 
baths, were taken on ahead of us and were ready when we 
arrived, riding quietly along in the cool of the morning. Then 
we camped, bathed, and had hazri, after which during the long 



34 DAN TO BEERSHEBA 

day we watched the peasant life of the village, and Captain 
Court held interminable colloquies with headmen, seated under 
huge banyan trees. His writer, a bdbu, squatted at his feet, 
busily taking notes, and at other times was seen juggling with 
large portfolios and sheets of paper which were the symbols of 
his office and importance. My own youthful laziness in this 
life of dolce far niente was tempered by the appearance, at 
stated intervals, of the grey-bearded old munshi who accom- 
panied us on all our travels, and who presented himself before 
me with polite bows, but an inexorable determination that I 
should read with him. My brother-in-law, an admirable lin- 
guist himself, would not allow any shirking. He was in many 
ways a brilliant personage, a fine billiard and racquet player, 
a good shot and crack rider. He survived my sister, but both 
are long since dead. 

The debt of gratitude I owed to my sister Janet at this 
period can never be repaid. She took me, a raw, rebellious 
cub, and gave me the chance of my life. When I left her to 
go to Burma she asked two favours of me — not as pledges, but 
as resolves : first, that I would not gamble, and second, that 
I would not get into debt. Her experience had shown her that 
these were the greatest pitfalls for young fellows like myself. 
She was of a proud and independent spirit and inculcated the 
same qualities in me. Whatever success has come to me in 
life I owe to her intervention at a critical point in my career, 
and to her wise, gentle influence. Reqaiescat in pace! 



CHAPTER V 

IN LOWER BURMA 

The first thing that struck me about Burma was its unlike- 
ness to India. I was much pleased with the novelty, for there 
was an amount of convention in Anglo-Indian life which was 
not congenial to me. To begin with, the physical features — 
a long coast-line, embracing the immense delta of a great net- 
work of rivers and creeks covered by forest of various kinds — 
were a contrast to the mountains and plains from which I 
had come, and the climatic change from dryness to extreme 
humidity was proportionate. At this time we occupied a long, 
narrow strip of coast-line — Arakan, Martaban and Tenasserim, 
acquired in 1824-26, and Pegu in 1852-53. Behind this strip 
lay an almost unknown land, Upper Burma to the north and 
northwest and Siam to the east. Burma, once a great empire 
stretching from Dacca to the Gulf of Siam, was now an inland 
State, whose only outlet lay through foreign territory, and 
whose authority throughout its borderland was fast dwindling. 
The people were very different to the Indians. Instead of the 
Bengalee — too often a cringing sycophant in those days — I met 
the frank and cheery Burmans, who were and are the most 
democratic of people and have the easiest and yet most cour- 
teous manners in the world. Here was no religious difference 
— no fanatical Mussulman nor fatalist Hindoo, but the child- 
like Buddhism of the Burmese, with its ritual of flowers, its 
carved and gilded pagodas and kyoungs, and its doctrine of 
charity and good works. Here were no feudal castles or es- 
tates or remnants of an aristocracy. Here, moreover, one was 
freed from that incubus of India, the hosts of more or less 
inefficient and lazy servants, and from a moderate bachelor 
household of ten to fifteen men I descended to about three. 
The cooking, I must confess, and the service generally were 
extremely indifferent, for yery few Burmese had been trained, 

35 



36 DAN TO BEERSHEBA 

and the best cooks were Arakanese, called Mugs, who were 
in great demand even in Calcutta, so that they were very scarce 
and expensive. The Madrasee cook was found only in the 
coast towns. The houses were another novelty to me, being 
always raised on piles with an open space beneath, instead of 
lying on the ground like an Indian bungalow. Here I first 
made acquaintance with the bamboo, one of the indispensables 
of life in all Malayan countries. The bamboo* builds houses, 
provides water pipes, cooking pots, masts of boats, ladders, 
vats, oil cans, water butts, boxes for clothes, musical instru- 
ments, bridges — every conceivable thing ! Yule called it the 
"staff of life" in Indo-China. What pleased me most in Burma 
was that one got out of the official rut and met in society the 
big merchants and their employees, so that "station talk" was 
not so universal and unending. 

When I first knew Rangoon it was a primitive place, with 
unpretentious Government house and secretariat, and a few 
official buildings. In the earlier days of our occupation this 
town, lying on the mud flats at the mouth of the Irrawaddy, 
was so unhealthy that its abandonment was contemplated, just 
as was that of Hong Kong. In both places science has tri- 
umphed, and a wonderfully clean bill of health is now usual. 
In 'yi Rangoon was not particularly salubrious, but the Euro- 
pean colony managed to get along with frequent visits to 
healthier climes. An evening trip on one of the river tug- 
boats was supposed to brace one up in the hot weather. The 
great disadvantage was the lack of any hill-station, and to 
this day there is no health resort, even in Upper Burma, worthy 
to be classed with Indian hill-stations like Simla, Naini Tal, 
Mussouree, or even Ooty (Ootacamund). For this reason it 
was necessary to go either home or to India for a change, the 
latter alternative being seldom chosen. Men preferred to save 
up and go home, the result being, very often, that the needed 
change was put off too long. Of the men who were my con- 
temporaries in various Government departments in 1871 many 
had dropped out by '89, when I left Burma, and practically 
none are now alive. Of course we did not have the luxuries 
so essential in sickness, and food was generally poor, even in 
Rangoon, much more so up-country, where we lived on the 
tinned foods of the period — nothing like so good as what is 
now sold. During this part of my life I acquired a dislike 



IN LOWER BURMA 37 

which almost amounts to loathing for tinned food, and though 
I have frequently since then been obliged to use it on journeys 
and in up-country stations, yet I always prefer to eat native 
food, however rough. I cannot even face a sardine with com- 
placency ! 

At the time of which I write milk was frequently unpro- 
curable in Burma, for to milk cows is against Burmese native 
practice, and ice was an unheard-of luxury except at Ran- 
goon and one or two of the larger stations. In India we took 
ice-machines, even when camping, but then we had the neces- 
sary labour to work them. In Burma we had no punkahs. It 
was fortunate the nights were cool, for where should we have 
found punkah-wallahs? The Burmese had not the incentive 
of grinding poverty to drive them, like Indians, into service, 
and, moreover, they dislike the method and discipline essential 
in such work. The result of all this was to strip life of its 
Indian superfluities, and to teach one the most salutary of all 
lessons — how to do without. 

During this period I had frequent changes of post from east, 
to west, and later on to what was then independent Burma, 
but my first station was at Moulmein, a beautifully situated little 
modern town on the bank of the Salween. The people here are 
the Talaings, or Mon (who had driven out the original inhab- 
itants) — a very attractive and pleasant people as far as manner 
goes. There are, of course, several races in Burma, and when 
we first took over the country they spoke different dialects, 
and even languages, which, however, are disappearing. Tra- 
dition speaks of a Shan kingdom in the north of Burma, and 
there was certainly one at Tali, in Yunnan, conquered by 
Kublai Khan in 1253, who disrupted the then great Shan 
power. A large proportion of the population of Southern 
China is undoubtedly Shan — an unsatisfactory generic term, 
but there is no better. As I shall often have to mention the 
Shans, with whom I first made acquaintance in Burma, but 
afterwards saw in Indo-China and Southern China, I may say 
here that with wide variations they present certain differences 
which distinguish them from the Chinese or Tartars. 
Some of the Shans have fair skins and grey eyes, but other- 
wise resemble the Burmese and Siamese in many respects ex- 
cept in the nose, which is more aquiline. 

My work as an assistant engineer chiefly consisted at first 



38 DAN TO BEERSHEBA 

in surveying for roads, and consequently often took me into 
regions where the white man had not yet made his appearance. 
I enjoyed the independence and freedom of the life, liked my 
work, and got much attached to the Burmese, as indeed are 
all who have spent any time among those most attractive peo- 
ple. Of course, their indolence was irritating at times, espe- 
cially when one was trying to get labour, and I remember one 
bit of work — embanking or reclamation — in which I was 
obliged to call in the women and children of the neighbouring 
villages and pay every one myself at the end of each day's 
labour. Seated at a table under a tree, I doled out coppers 
from a big bag — a lengthy, tedious proceeding, but effective. 
The attraction to the villagers was twofold : First, they did not 
have to take it on trust that six days' labour would be recom- 
pensed altogether; second, the mengyee himself handed out 
the daily earning without such deductions as would certainly 
have been made by the headman. In this way they grew accus- 
tomed to the idea of working for us, and later on the contract 
system became possible. 

I often wonder whether the great network of law and sys- 
tem which we have gradually spread over Burma, making it 
into little more than another Indian province, has sufficient 
compensations for what it has destroyed. Burma, I am told, 
is a dull and uniform country nowadays ; and, if we have estab- 
lished order, we have introduced spirits and undermined their 
religious beliefs. Burma used to enjoy a very large amount 
of local authority under the village headmen, who had consid- 
erable power both for good and evil, and used it both ways; 
and under their own rulers the play and the boat race, and 
many other amusements, were encouraged. Whatever the dis- 
advantages of the system, it was a growth of the soil and 
suited the Burmese temperament in many ways. We have 
replaced it by a bureaucracy, and the headman, gradually 
shorn of his prerogatives, is replaced by the official and the 
"municipality." The official is, of course, both more efficient 
and more upright than the headman ; but he is an official and 
an alien. 

My work took me to different sections of the country, from 
the flat plains at the mouth of the Irrawaddy to the mountain- 
ous districts of Arakan and Tenasserim. I particularly re- 



IN LOWER BURMA 39 

member one station because of the Gilbertian nature of social 
relations there. We were a very limited community — a dep- 
uty commissioner and his wife, a police officer and his wife, 
and myself, a young assistant engineer. Unhappily, the two 
ladies had quarrelled over a cow belong to one, which had 
strolled into the compound of the other. The original offence 
does not seem very great, but the two were not on speaking 
terms and the feud had extended to the husbands. I was the 
connecting link and had to exercise considerable tact in order 
to keep on good terms with both. If I went to tiffin with one, 
I called later in the day on the other, and the slightest cour- 
tesy had to be made in duplicate. A travelling parson who 
sometimes visited us was equally on thorns during his visit, 
and dare not be seen walking with either lady ! Ludicrous as 
it may seem, this situation lasted for the better part of the 
time I was there — nearly a year. After such an experience 
I quite enjoyed bachelor stations, where I was, more than once, 
the lord of all I surveyed, and sometimes did not see a white 
face for months. I did all sorts of work: surveying roads, 
embankments, canals, and, lastly, was employed on the first 
railway in Burma, from Rangoon to Prome. Most of the 
work was fairly easy and primitive, and the executive and 
chief engineers were competent men who were brought in 
from outside, or else R.E. officers — not Cooper's Hill men, 
whose day came later. We were really at the beginning of 
things in Burma, for even roads did not exist in many parts, 
and to this day Arakan is practically roadless. It is thirty- 
seven years since I surveyed a road from Martaban (opposite 
Moulmein) towards Rangoon, and only this year has a railway 
been opened to connect these two principal seaport towns of 
Burma. 

It was during my second stay at Rangoon, when I was on 
the railway already mentioned, that I made my entrance into 
literature, or rather journalism, with a series of would-be sa- 
tirical sketches called "Paddyville Papers," which I contrib- 
uted to the Rangoon Gazette. A friend of mine was its editor, 
and kept the secret of the authorship, which was just as well 
for me, since I castigated local society and foibles with con- 
siderable freedom. Paddyville was, of course, Rangoon, from 
the paddy or rice fields (Malay: padi = rice) with which that 



40 DAN TO BEERSHEBA 

town was surrounded. There was much discussion in the 
club and drawing rooms over this youthful effort of mine, and 
I kept my counsel discreetly and smiled at the flutter in the 
dovecot. I certainly enjoyed myself very much when, at a 
dinner-table, I heard my humble efforts attributed to the chief 
judge, because he was said to be the only man sufficiently tal- 
ented to write them ! I wagged my head and quite agreed, but 
this was my first and last attempt at social satire, and from 
what I recollect of them I do not think the Paddyville Papers 
showed any special talent in that line. Such small societies 
as ours in Burma always afford good material for caricature, 
and any personal peculiarities are seized on in a country where 
topics are few. My own nickname was "Blazes." We really 
had some quaint and original people, however, and it is only 
the possibility that some may still be alive that restrains me 
from describing them. The hero of the following, however, 
is beyond the reach of ridicule. He was one of the first mili- 
tary-civilians in Burma — needless to say before my time. When 
going out he had C.B. painted on all his trunks and boxes. 
"We didn't know you were a C.B., old man!" said his friends. 
But the C.B. stood for "Commissioner, Burma." Another 
worthy was once attending some function, and a friend asked 
why his breast was adorned with a Mutiny medal. "Sad busi- 
ness!" he replied. "Dear friend of mine — made me promise 
always to wear it." 

I might have stayed in Burma and risen from grade to grade 
till I retired on a pension as superintending engineer or was 
tucked away underground like so many of my contemporaries, 
but a curious chance got me out of my rut. In 1879 it was 
decided to send a mission to Siam in connection with certain 
questions as to the forests lying between Burma and the Shan 
State of Zimmay. Colonel Street was at the head of this mis- 
sion, and desired to have with him as secretary a civilian with 
some knowledge of surveying who could make a route map 
as they marched. There was some competition for this post, 
which in the ordinary way would have been filled by the chief 
from his own friends or acquaintances. As a matter of fact, 
he had a near relation who wanted it and was qualified. Luck- 
ily for me, he happened to hold extreme views on nepotism, 
and declined to nominate or select anyone, much less to take 



IN LOWER BURMA 41 

one of his own relations. He requested the head of the Public 
Works Department to select someone, and to my delight and 
surprise I was the fortunate individual. Being entirely with- 
out family influence myself, I owed my chance in life to the 
unusual fair-mindedness of a stranger. 



CHAPTER VI 

A MISSION TO SIAM 

We left for Siam and Zimmay in 1879, intending to have 
an interview with the King of Siam at Bangkok, and then 
proceed up the Menam River to the Shan State of Zimmay, 
but eventually we returned to Moulmein, ascended the Sal- 
ween, and marched across the mountain range which divides 
Burma and Siam. This journey took us first to Singapore, 
where Sir Cecil Clementi Smith was Acting-Governor, and 
then to the river-city of Bangkok, the Venice of the East, 
which was still little known and seldom visited by Europeans. 

The present King Chulalongkorn was on the throne, where 
he succeeded his father in 1868. He had been partially edu- 
cated by an English lady, Mrs. Leonowens, whose experiences 
as the only European at the Siamese Court make most inter- 
esting reading. Chulalongkorn's father was an extraordinary 
character. He had an enormous harem and thousands of 
women slaves, and this great community of helpless women 
literally held their existence at his lightest wish, and were ex- 
alted, cast into prison, or executed at his whim. Mrs. Leon- 
owens did her best to help and teach these poor creatures, and 
to exert a wholesome influence on her royal pupils. Chula- 
longkorn was much attached to her, but was taken from her 
teaching at an early age to enter a monastery — part of the 
usual training of Siamese youths. His father was a diligent 
student of English and thought himself a great hand at com- 
position. On one occasion he sent for the English consul in 
the middle of the night, and that unfortunate official, fearing 
some disaster, was dragged hastily to the palace only to find 
the royal author in the throes of composition and desirous of 
some further light on the respective meanings of the words 
"soul" and "spirit." 

The impression created on us by Bangkok was by no means 

42 



A MISSION TO SIAM 43 

favourable. On the surface there was a good deal of gaiety, 
but the evidences of a grinding slavery were as palpable as 
the official corruption and procrastination which obstructed 
our negotiations. During a later visit, I was able to inquire 
more fully into the social conditions, and my impression was 
confirmed. About nine-tenths of the non-Chinese population 
were slaves and still more were serfs, forced to work without 
pay at certain seasons of the year. Justice was a farce, sold 
to the highest bidder. Taxes, which were very heavy, were 
farmed to Chinese monopolists, and not one-fourth reached 
the Government. The officials were miserably paid. The 
Deputy Lord Mayor, who was also Magistrate, High Cham- 
berlain, and Gold-Stick-in-Waiting, got 200 ticals or ^20 an- 
nually. Yet he owned rice fields and mills, had several houses, 
a steamer, many wives and concubines, and innumerable cattle 
and slaves. Our party was hospitably entertained by the consul- 
general, Mr. X., who had been in Bangkok a number of years 
had had married a Siamese lady. The menage was a curious 
mixture of European and native, and the house was full of 
little Siamese serving girls, really domestic slaves, who chat- 
tered and ran in and out and behaved in a manner which, I 
think, scandalised some members of our party. There were 
already one or two Europeans in minor official positions in 
Siam, and I think their experiences were very similar to those 
of the men who came later in greater numbers. As long as 
they were at their posts they could make the machinery work — 
if stiffly, but should they turn their backs the whole of their 
employees went off on a holiday. Probably a little more se- 
riousness has now been imported into public affairs, but I have 
heard tales, of a fairly recent date, which go to show that, from 
highest to lowest, the Siamese regard their European advisers 
in the same way as does a naughty schoolboy his strict master. 
At the date of my first visit many of the worst abuses of des- 
potism still remained. Both the king and his secretary, Prince 
Devawongtse, were genuinely desirous of reform, but they 
had to tilt against the vested interests of the only educated 
and influential section of their subjects, which were bound 
up with the traditions of an oriental court. The atmosphere 
of the harem, moreover, was enervating, and palace intrigues 
innumerable blocked the way to every serious reform. The 
country was, for the most part, parcelled out among the mem- 



44 DAN TO BEERSHEBA 

bers of the royal family — that is, the portions which were 
under control. The Shan States, such as Zimmay, were prac- 
tically independent, although shortly before this time the King 
had begun to introduce Siamese commissioners as the basis 
of a future control. The representative of Great Britain at 
Bangkok was Mr. (now Sir Ernest) Satow, who has held the 
position of Minister at the Courts of Siam, China, and Japan, 
and is also well known as a student of Japanese literature. He 
had a library of Japanese books at Bangkok. 

The first town of any size at which we stopped was Hmine 
Long-gyee, and here we were received by the chief official of 
the place, who wore a German helmet and second-hand military 
jacket, a Siamese sarong and French patent leather shoes. His 
nails gave evidence of his gentlity by being so long that he 
could not have performed manual labour for at least a year. 
His title was the equivalent of the Burmese Myo-tsa — literally 
"town-eater" — extremely appropriate. He sent five riding ele- 
phants to meet us, and treated us with great hospitality, but 
to our annoyance our Burmese followers gave themselves great 
airs of superiority over the Shans. They have always despised 
these people, and our own followers, with their superficial ac- 
quaintance with European ideas, arrogated to themselves the 
superiority of civilised beings over mere savages. The Red 
Karens, some of whom we saw, have a bad reputation, but both 
they and the White Karens when civilised are very gentle 
and charming people, and in Burma already much had been 
done to Christianise them. They were practically pagans, 
which accounts for the fact that they were very amenable to 
missionary influence and became really genuine Christians — 
not "curry and rice converts." These Karens were probably 
tribes drivin south from China by the Shans, and then driven 
back by the Burmese into the hill country. 

We noticed in the bazaar that arsenic, vitriol and other 
poisonous drugs were mixed up with more innocent medicines, 
and on making inquiry about this we were told that the favour- 
ite specific was just then out of stock. It was called bangilla, 
and we were assured of its magic properties for every ailment, 
so that we puzzled ourselves as to what it could be and thought 
we had found some new native drug. Eventually it turned 
out to be an American "pain-killer," and if I remembered the 
particular brand I would give it a gratuitous advertisement! 



A MISSION TO SIAM 45 

Our departure from this town was the occasion of a grand 
procession, and we left in state escorted by the "town-eater" 
in full uniform and his young lady friends in full undress. 
This is saying a good deal, for the local costume consisted 
merely of a striped sarong, or skirt, and a kerchief over the 
head. Jackets had been introduced but had not yet "caught 
on," except in ultra-fashionable circles, and the elder ladies 
(who had more reason) adopted them less gladly. 

I must mention that all along our march houses were built 
for us by order of the king. They were stoutly constructed of 
bamboo, and had raised floors and verandahs, so we were very 
comfortable. Necessaries were also supplied, such as rice, 
fish, vegetables, fruit, and firewood, and we thought at first 
these were official gifts. But when we discovered that they 
were a local corvee we insisted on paying for them, though 
I very much doubt if the money went to the right quarters, and 
our conduct won us more derision than gratitude. 

On the eighteenth day we marched into Zimmay, a proces- 
sion more imposing in size than in appearance, for we Euro- 
peans were dirty, unkempt and travel-stained, our servants 
were worse, and we had picked up a tagrag-and-bobtail of 
followers and elephants. We were well received and lodged 
in a nice little bamboo bungalow in the style of a French cot- 
tage ornec specially built for us under the direction of the 
Siamese commissioner. He was a dapper little old gentleman, 
who had come from Bangkok and knew all about European 
ways. It was the strangest thing to sit in the heart of this 
half-savage country drinking wine and coffe with a little old 
Siamese who knew London and Paris — for he was a travelled 
man and loved to talk, especially of the not too proper quar- 
tiers of the latter city. "Too much plenty work in London ; 
plenty pleasure Paris," he said, with a twinkle of his little 
black eyes. Our cottage ornee was furnished with European 
furniture and Parisian gimcracks, and looked like something 
out of opera-bouffe. The cooking, on pseudo-French lines, 
was equally farcical, and represented our old friend's Paris 
recollections as carried out by Yunnanese cooks. Luckily there 
was bread and good China tea. 

We found American missionaries at work in Zimmay, who 
were very glad to have converse with Anglo-Saxons again. 
They came up from Bangkok and had a most tedious river 



46 DAN TO BEERSHEBA 

journey, as the boats frequently stranded and had to be dug 
out. I may mention here that the first impressions I got of 
missionary work have never been dispelled — i.e., that it is 
practically waste of time to preach Christianity to Buddhists, 
whereas there are many pagan and semi-pagan peoples who 
are eagerly converted and make good Christians. As for 
Buddhism in the Shan States and in Burma and Siam gener- 
ally, great differences exist, which must be considered when 
forming an opinion on the whole. Bishop Bigandet at Ran- 
goon, who had forty or more years' experience of the Bur- 
mese, had the highest opinion of the influence of their religion 
and of its purity and nobility. This was probably because his 
researches into their literature brought him in contact with 
theoretical Buddhism, of the purified character which at one 
time prevailed in Burma. For myself I found very little to 
admire in Buddhism as I saw it in the Shan States, and while 
some travellers testify to the purity of life beneath the yellow 
robe, I saw laziness, immorality and corruption in most of the 
monasteries we visited. A very intelligent Peguan whom I 
met at Zimmay admitted this to be the case, but added that 
no generalisation was possible — there are good priests and 
bad priests everywhere. In Burma matters are not nearly so 
bad, but Buddhism is not the idealised religion of Fielding 
Hall's books. In Siam not only the common beliefs but the 
texts of the Pali books have become overlaid with a vast 
amount of commentaries and fables, and the ritual is debased 
by many childish observances. King Chulalongkorn was at- 
tempting a process of purification at the time of my first visit, 
but my impression was that the spirit of Buddhism had been 
lost, and not merely obscured. As for the method of educa- 
tion by which a boy is handed over to the poongyes (priests) 
and lives as a novice in a monastery for several of the most 
impressionable years of his life, nothing could have a more 
fatal effect on the manhood of the country. The boy is re- 
pressed in all natural and innocent manifestations ; at the best 
he becomes apathetic and lazy in the monastic atmosphere, at 
the worst he learns to be hypocritical and vicious as well. 
Modern education is now established in Siam, as well as in 
Burma, but the hereditary tendencies and the atmosphere cre- 
ated by the thousands of monasteries and tens of thousands 
of monks leading for the most part an idle and useless life, can- 



A MISSION TO SIAM 47 

not easily be counteracted. The superiority of the women of 
both Siam and Burma and their business capacity and energy 
is largely due to their freedom in youth from any such cramp- 
ing and stultifying influence as is spread round the boys. 

Our mission stayed some weeks in Zimmay, and was fairly 
successful in arranging the disputes as to forests, which was 
our main object. We then returned to Moulmein, and I re- 
sumed my professional duties somewhat reluctantly. The fact 
was that during this journey I was bitten by two of the 
interests which have remained with me ever since. In the 
first place I became profoundly attracted by the political 
and ethnological study of Indo-China, and having read all I 
could lay my hands on upon the subject, I became extremely 
anxious to push my investigations further. At this time Siam 
was trembling in the balance between France and ourselves, 
as was Upper Burma at a later date. Our Burmese territory 
was then limited to a strip along the coast, and north of us 
were the kingdom of Burma, some independent tribes, and 
the huge block of independent Shan country. I was possessed 
with the desire to checkmate the advance of France in Tong- 
king by a counter movement towards Yunnan through Siam 
and the independent Shan country. The scheme I could not 
work out in detail until later, but the idea was fermenting in 
my brain, and thus the little mission to Zimmay introduced 
me to the world of high politics and that fascinating subject 
of communications which has ever since absorbed so much of 
my interest. 

Soon after I got back from Zimmay I took my first leave 
and went home, after being absent for twelve years. I re- 
ceived a warm welcome from my father and stepmother and 
made some useful friends, for my journey to so little known 
a country as Northern Siam marked me out from the run of 
young fellows. Among these friends was Colonel Sir Henry 
Yule, the famous editor of "Marco Polo" and one of the 
most erudite of oriental scholars, who was deeply interested 
in Burma, having been secretary to Phayre's "Mission to Ava" 
in 1855 ; he wrote his classic on that mission a few years later. 
Yule was a most remarkable man who, after a distinguished 
career in the East as a Bengal engineer, retired in 1862 and 
settled at Palermo, where he lived for about twelve years, 
working on his monumental "Marco Polo." After this he 



48 DAN TO BEERSHEBA 

was appointed to the India Council and lived in London until 
his death in 1889. In later years he developed certain eccen- 
tricities, among which was an idea that he had no money. 
His friends and the India Council believed this, and the. latter 
made certain arrangements to provide for his reduced circum- 
stances. It was no uncommon thing on visiting him to be 
asked to share a frugal meal, or even invited to dinner, with 
an apology for the fact that he could not afford to offer wine. 
He was always interested in travels and scientific research, and 
was most kind to young fellows like myself, and we all viewed 
his poverty in later days with grave concern, though we could 
not understand the cause of it, since he had several sources 
of income. When he died it was discovered that he left a con- 
siderable fortune ! Yule was a man of scrupulous honour and 
very strong feeling, which he carried into politics. His bete 
noir was Gladstone, whom he regarded as England's evil 
genius and satirised in bitter verses as well as in conversation. 
To the influence of this distinguished member of the Royal 
Geographical Society I now owed an opportunity for carrying 
out one of my designs. I wanted to explore Southern China 
with a view to my famous route to Yunnan. The attempts 
made by the Government of India to enter Yunnan, in later 
years through Bhamo, had failed disastrously, and I was de- 
termined to make the attempt from the China coast, thus re- 
versing the point of attack. It was a fairly ambitious design 
for a young engineer, with no money except a few pounds 
saved from his salary of about £450 per annum. My calcula- 
tions were made carefully. I wanted a companion, and found 
one who would go anywhere in the person of Charles Wahab, 
also an engineer, whose brother was a great friend of mine. 
I had enough money to pay our passages out, second-class, to 
Hong Kong, and to leave a few pounds over for the necessary 
outfit. We had introductions at Hong Kong and also at Can- 
ton, and knew that we could count on hospitality and get 
started on our way. A couple of servants and an interpreter 
would be all we should want, and I knew I could arrange to 
pay these at the end of our journey — if we got to the end — 
out of pay which would then be due. I had learnt enough 
about travelling in the East to know that it can be done with- 
out a train of baggage and guards, the only drawback in our 
case being that neither of us spoke Chinese and that Southern 



A MISSION TO SIAM 49 

China was far from peaceful at the time. The route we pro- 
posed, and afterwards followed, was to a large extent unex- 
plored, and we intended to make full surveys as we went along. 
An item in our equipment which would have been outside my 
slender means was the necessary outfit of scientific and sur- 
veying instruments. These were lent me by the Royal Geo- 
graphical Society at the instance of Colonel Yule. Thus 
equipped, and with a heart as light as my pockets, I left for 
China in a great hurry, anxious to utilise the dry season and 
to get well on my way during the year's leave to which I was 
entitled. I trusted to an extension of leave, if necessary, but 
my main idea was to make a start, because it seemed at that 
time such a harebrained escapade, going into the heart of 
China with very little save the clothes we stood up in, that I 
was afraid someone or something might intervene and stop us ! 



CHAPTER VII 

I EXPLORE SOUTHERN CHINA 

By a fortunate coincidence I found that Sir Harry Parkes, 
then British Minister at Tokio, was on board the vessel which 
was taking us out to China. I made his acquaintance and 
succeeded in interesting him in our proposed journey, which 
was a very useful thing for me, as he was able to give excel- 
lent advice and introductions. 

Sir Harry Parkes was well qualified to give advice on this 
subject, having seen a good deal of China. It was he who, 
with Loch, was taken prisoner by the Chinese in 1861 and was 
placed in heavy chains for eleven days and subjected to minor 
tortures before rescue came; but he was not carried about in 
a cage, as commonly believed. Parkes refused release except 
with Loch. They had a very narrow squeak for their lives, 
as a quarter of an hour after the order for their release came 
from Prince Kung an order signed by the Emperor (then in 
hiding at Mongolia) came for their immediate execution ! Al- 
though not an erudite scholar or sinologue like Wade, whom 
he succeeded in 1883, he had the quality of shrewd common- 
sense, which is extremely valuable in dealing with the Chinese, 
and despite his experiences he had a high opinion of both 
Chinese and Japanese. He appeared to me to be a very good 
type of Englishman, prompt, energetic, tenacious of purpose, 
and thoroughly and profoundly patriotic, without any trace 
of sentiment or jingoism. He gave me letters to Sir John Pope 
Hennessy, governor of Hong Kong, and to Mr. Hewlett, con- 
sul at Canton. 

On board our steamer were a number of French officers and 
officials going out to Saigon, and I was much interested in 
their talk, as this was a period of great activity in Indo-China. 
I picked up information about the expedition of Gamier and 
concerning the gifted Louis de Carne, who had written a 
charming account of their adventurous journey. 

50 



I EXPLORE SOUTHERN CHINA 51 

At Hong Kong I presented my letter, which at once gained 
me a favourable reception from the governor. Pope Hennessy 
was in many ways a very singular character. His talents and 
personal charm — when he chose — were undoubted, but he was 
of such a quarrelsome and tricky disposition that to get him 
out of the Irish parliamentary party (where he was a mauvais 
sujet) he was given a colonial governorship, I think in the 
West Indies first. He quarrelled with all his subordinates, 
and fell out with the mercantile population because, wherever 
he went, he adopted an extreme pro-native attitude and even 
stirred up discontent among the people. When he was gov- 
ernor of Mauritius, later on, he had a famous dispute with 
Clifford Lloyd, the Colonial Secretary, who was also a hot- 
tempered Irishman, and the Government actually sent out a 
commission to inquire into the rights and wrongs of the quar- 
rel. Sir Hercules Robinson, who conducted the first inquiry 
into the affair, had suspended Pope Hennessy, but Sir Henry 
Holland, Secretary of State, decided to reinstate him. The 
Times of July 16th, 1887, contains a leader with a strong pro- 
test against sending him back to a community in which he was 
so unpopular, beginning "Not guilty — but the prisoner is ad- 
vised not to do it again!" Hennessy was supported by the 
Government, largely, it was hinted, because they did not want 
to bring him home ! This stormy petrel was in the very worst 
odour among the Hong Kong merchants when I arrived, but 
I believed him to be benevolently disposed towards myself, 
and he promised to do "anything I asked" to help me on my 
way. 

We hired a ho-tau, or houseboat, of the type commonly used 
on Chinese rivers. It was really quite a luxurious floating 
home — the best we were to know for many a long day. The 
ho-tau was a fiat-bottomed hulk, with a deckhouse divided 
into three compartments by sliding partitions. At the bow a 
space was left for working the heavy oar-helm, and on each 
side of the boat, about a foot above water, ran an eighteen-inch 
footboard along which the crew ran or walked as they poled. 
The deck, or rather roof, was waterproofed, and all sorts of 
odds and ends were littered over it, and in the stern was a 
small space where the crew was packed at night. Over this 
was a tiny cabin for the captain, who frequently took his 
wife along with him. Ours did not on this trip, for which 



52 DAN TO BEERSHEBA 

we were grateful, as these ladies frequently have terrible 
tongues which they exercise on the crews. 

I cannot linger over the details of our voyage up stream, 
with its interesting glimpses of native life in the towns and 
villages we passed, because a full account, written from diaries 
laboriously compiled at the time, is contained in my book "Across 
Chryse." One of the most curious things we saw was the 
fishermen fishing with cormorants, the birds having a ring 
round their necks so that they cannot swallow the fish but 
yield it up to their master's net. Sometimes they are trained 
to give it up without any artificial prohibition. This curious 
custom has been often described, but I have never seen it ex- 
cept on the Canton River. As we passed through Kwangsi 
we began to experience hostility on the part of the natives, and 
avoided the larger towns as far as possible. 

At Pe-se it was our intention to leave the ho-tau and send 
back in her some of the heavier instruments and books while 
we continued for a short distance in a light canoe before taking 
the road over the mountains to Yunnan. For some days, how- 
ever, there had been a lack of harmony in our company, which 
was chiefly attributable to the attitude of Mr. Hong Beng- 
Kaw. He had never quite accepted the position which he 
was intended to fill, and, although we were only too anxious 
to retain him and to treat him on terms of perfect equality, 
in such an expedition as ours there had to be a leader, and 
I intended, as Americans say, to be It. In addition to this 
it became perfectly apparent to us that our interpreter's heart 
was failing him as we neared the more arduous and perilous 
part of our journey. He had imagined a far more imposing 
and luxurious expedition, with coolies to carry us in chairs, 
and when he found we meant to go on foot he was a good 
deal damped in his enthusiasm. Moreover, all sorts of stories 
about the dangers ahead were retailed to us and our boatmen 
brought us the news that a placard had been posted at Nan- 
ning, in the gambling quarter of the city, saying that two for- 
eigners were coming there, and calling on the people not to 
allow the "red barbarians" to come to their country, destroy 
their religion, and take away their good luck. The reward 
of fifty taels was offered to the first man to give information 
of our arrival, and two hundred taels (about £50) for each 
of our heads. The rumour of a placard had reached us below 



I EXPLORE SOUTHERN CHINA 53 

Nanning, and when we got to that place we did not land, or 
stay a second longer than we could help, but the effect of all 
this on the nerves of Mr. Hong Beng-Kaw was not salutary. 

At the news of Hong Beng-Kaw's decision the servants said 
they would go back too, and it looked as though our well- 
laid plans were ruined. But my companion and I were deter- 
mined to go on, nothing could have deterred us, and we made 
up our minds to make our way alone to Yunnan-fu, where 
we knew that we should find a French mission station. The 
kindness of a chance acquaintance had secured me a letter 
from the head of the Jesuit Order in England, Father Beckx, 
which commended me strongly (though not a co-religionist) 
to the good offices of all Catholic missionaries. Having made 
out this plan we told the servants, and then the unexpected 
happened. The tinchai declared that he could not let us go 
alone but would go "anywhere" with us. He acted from 
mixed motives, for he would not have dared to return to Mr. 
Hewlett and acknowledge that he had deserted us without 
either servant or interpreter, and in case of anything happen- 
ing to us he would have got into serious trouble. Still, he 
was a useful man at the start, intelligent and handy without 
being much educated, and he did not show the white feather 
till later in our subsequent adventures. With him to interpret 
we could spare Mr. Hong Beng-Kaw, and carry out our origi- 
nal plan, and this we proceeded to do after the most kind and 
friendly treatment from the Prefect and the General of Pe-se. 
We were particularly flattered that these officials asked to have 
their photographs and those of their children taken, and the 
general even went outside Chinese etiquette so far as to ask 
us to take his "humble w T ife." This man was actually at Teng- 
yueh at the time of Margary's murder and ought to have been 
able to protect him, but declared that he was in mourning at 
the time — murning within the Chinese meaning entire retire- 
ment from life, even official duties. He gave us letters and 
a guard of "braves" to escort us on the first part of our jour- 
ney, and we went off from Pe-se with great dignity and much 
inward jubilation. I remember that the most awe-inspiring 
feature about our Chinese guard was the word "brave" (or 
its nearest equivalent) embroidered on the breasts of their 
coats. 

After leaving Wuchau, on the lower reaches of the Canton 



54 DAN TO BEERSHEBA 

River, we had begun to explore, as no other European had 
penetrated beyond that point. Nor had anyone passed through 
southern Yunnan from east to west as we marched, though 
the French expedition had touched our route at Szumao, strik- 
ing north again at Mengtzu. Indeed, from Wuchau until we 
reached Tali we were in country never before visited by white 
men (except by the French for a small part) and to our ordi- 
nary fatigues were added those of making a continuous survey 
and writing up everything at the end of the day's march. 

The greatest difficulty we had to fear was that the rains 
would render it impossible to travel down from the Yunnan 
plateau to the lower levels of the Shan States, and this was 
eventually the one factor in the case with which we could 
not contend. When we reached Szumao, the point near the 
Shan frontier whence we wished to strike south, we were met 
by opposition from the local officials and from our own ser- 
vants. I thought then, and still think, that had we been pro- 
vided with an English interpreter, who would have been with 
us in our desire to push through at all hazards, we might have 
carried out our programme. But we were indescribably ham- 
pered by the obvious desire of the tinchai to raise difficulties 
instead of overcoming them. The upshot of this was that 
the prefect refused permission for us to go on, and without 
that we could get no transport. To go without was impos- 
sible, especially as Wahab had to be carried, and I had to 
acquiesce with as good a grace as I could assume in the wreck 
of my plans. It was the bitterest moment of my life, espe- 
cially as I was not able to find out how far the difficulties 
were real and how much they owed to the vivid imagination 
of my chicken-livered interpreter. 

The one consolation I had in my disappointment was that 
the necessary change of plan enabled me to get even with the 
tinchai, for a time at all events. I now decided that I would 
strike north to Tali, a march of twenty days, which would 
afford me an opportunity of exploring another part of Yunnan. 
Tali was on the route of the Grosvenor mission and Gill's 
expedition, so it was not specially interesting to me, but it 
was the only place where I ran any chance of finding someone 
who could help me to reach the Burmese frontier at another 
point. I knew a French Roman Catholic mission had been 
at work there, sent from Yunnan-fu where there was a bishop. 



I EXPLORE SOUTHERN CHINA 55 

My introductory letters from Bishop Chose at Canton and 
from Father Beckx, the head of the Jesuit Order, would, I 
knew, secure me the good offices of any French missionaries. 
I also hoped at Tali to find a Chinese-speaking Shan with 
whom I could communicate in Burmese and thus get rid of 
the tinchai. I therefore told him — to his great surprise, for 
he was full of pride and insolence at his victory over me — 
that I did not need his services any more. He had, in reality, 
no desire to be abandoned at this place, which would involve 
his making the long journey back alone, so he changed his 
note at once and begged me to take him on. 

Although we were heartbroken at being turned back from 
Szumao the interest of our march towards Tali consoled us, 
for it lay through country inhabited by aboriginal tribes whose 
appearance and manners were sufficiently various to give new 
interest. We received many tokens of the friendliness of the 
people. On on occasion I went into a peasant hut for shade 
and fell asleep. On waking I found the lady of the house 
and her husband who instead of objecting to my presence 
brought a mattress and some tea and rice cake, and finally 
a palm leaf fan with which the lady kept off the flies while I 
had a refreshing nap. The women are often very comely and 
fair and the men fine specimens of humanity. Poor Wahab 
was now too ill to walk at all, suffering from dysentery and 
consequent ailments. He persisted in drinking unboiled water, 
which the Chinese themselves never touch and which I myself 
avoided. In many parts of Yunnan we came across beautiful- 
looking streams over which were erected tablets, warning trav- 
ellers that these waters are poisoned. Probably they contain 
some dangerous mineral or are polluted in some way, but they 
must be pretty bad for the Chinese to take such precautions. 
We were both knocked up when we got to Tali, but there a 
pleasant surprise awaited us. 

I had expected to find a French Roman Catholic mission 
there, but what was my delight to hear an English voice out- 
side my inn! The owner was a member of the China Inland 
Mission, Mr. George Clarke, who with his wife had recently 
come down, a long and toilsome journey, from the Yangtze. 
They had had a great deal of discomfort and worse to endure, 
being at first unable to get a decent house or a servant to wait 
on them, but by tact and patience they had overcome the Chi- 



56 , DAN TO BEERSHEBA 

nese prejudices to the extent of establishing a school for a 

few children. The heroism necessary for such an enterprise 
for an English lady is something beyond mere words. Need- 
less to say, a meal presided over by a white lady seemed to 
us the height of luxury, and we stayed a week at Tali, being 
doctored and cared for by our kind friends. Fifteen years 
later I met Mr. Clarke again at Tientsin and reminded him 
of our first encounter. 

At Tali we were on the track of other travellers, and had 
not the stimulus of exploration to carry us on. Nevertheless, 
the journey which we had still to make, to Bhamo, was the 
w T orst and most dangerous part of our whole expedition. This 
was because the rains had set in, no caravans were travelling, 
the roads were almost impassable, and the country bordering 
Upper Burma was said to be in a disturbed state, which we 
found to be only too true. Other drawbacks, such as the fact 
that plague was raging along some parts of the route to be 
traversed, troubled me comparatively little, as we had already 
come through plague-stricken valleys, but I realised the danger 
later on when my mule stumbled over a dead body outside 
a village and I saw my muleteers making a detour to avoid it, 
though they never attempted to warn me from touching the 
corpse. With the help of Mr. Clarke we engaged our caravan 
and started off with only seven mules — two for ourselves, two 
for our servants, and three for baggage. We deposed the 
cook from his office, as it was ridiculous paying him for Euro- 
pean cookery when his limit was rice and hard boiled eggs! 
He came along with us, but we all now fed Chinese fashion, 
on contract, like the men of our caravan. This was a great 
economy, and relieved a little of our ever-present anxiety about 
money. After a couple of days we were riding through a 
small town when I heard the words "Englishman !" in French 
accents, and looking up saw, over a garden wall, a French 
priest in Chinese dress. Pere Terrasse was deighted to have 
a chat with us. The poor fellow was murdered later on. Two 
days more and we reached Chu-tung, where we found another 
French missionary, Pere Vial, who set us on our way next 
day most courteously. 

After ploughing along for several days, it became apparent 
to us that something was wrong. And here I must remind 
the reader that, throughout all our physical troubles and pre- 



I EXPLORE SOUTHERN CHINA 57 

occupations with what we saw, we had to keep our eyes and 
ears wide open, to remember trustworthy itineraries, and ask 
frequent questions and calculate distances, for we could not 
trust in these matters to our escort or servants. When we left 
Tali, our head muleteer had contracted to get us to Bhamo 
and to find out en route which was the best road to take, for 
at one point a new road had been made which was longer than 
the old one and ran alongside the Salween river for some dis- 
tance — a region reputed most unhealthy in this season. The 
word "road" conveys an idea to European ears which is some- 
what erroneous. There are "roads" in China, both bad and 
good, but these were not "made" in our sense of the word. 
This "road" had been "made" by the border official, Li-si-tai, 
the man who was responsible for the Margary murder and a 
person of whom I had heard a good deal and mostly evil. On 
my inquiring as to which road we were to take, I was told 
"whichever I chose," and eventually I detected a nice little 
plot, in which our worthy interpreter joined with the muleteer. 
The contract was that the latter should be responsible for 
choosing the road, but by shunting the decision on to me he 
would be able to lead me to the frontier, probably embroil me 
in difficulties and, while exonerating himself, would be in a 
position to make terms for our safe return to Tali. 

Luckily we were not so very far from Chu-tung, where we 
had left Pere Vial, and we felt that if we could only get rid 
of the rascally interpreter we should get along better. We 
arranged that I should stay where I was, while Wahab rode 
back to seek help and advice from the Pere. We ordered two 
mules but they never turned up, and although we hunted the 
town we could not hire any — we had been forestalled. The 
two conspirators were in high glee, especially when that 
evening we went out for a walk, called at the magistrate's and, 
sending in our cards by the boy Akiu, presented our compli- 
ments to him and said we were returning to Chu-tung next 
morning. Our Chinese was equal to this emergency, though 
not very fluent. "How could we go without mules?" chuckled 
our friends. Next morning, however, we paid our bill, put all 
the silver we possessed in our pockets, and started off on foot, 
remarking to cur dumbfounded suite that they could either 
stay or go as they chose. At midday, when we were sitting 
at a wayside inn having some tea, they rode up, rather crest- 



58 DAN TO BEERSHEBA 

fallen. After a most trying- three days' journey, during which 
I had a severe attack of fever, which I "brought out" by doses 
of "pain-killer" in hot tea — a drastic but effective remedy — we 
reached Chu-tung and found Pere Vial, on whom all our hopes 
were now centred. 

He had intended going down to Burma some months later 
and with the greatest willingness offered now to accompany 
us, though it meant no light sacrifice to attempt the journey 
at this season. I sacked the tinchai, giving him his fare back 
to Canton and a draft for his wages, payable only if we got 
through safely to Rangoon, as I thought he would deserve noth- 
ing if we came to grief. Besides, unless I survived to draw my 
next half-year's salary, there would be no money for anyone ! 
There was a caravan of Cantonese traders going back from Tali, 
so I knew he could get through, and in fact I afterwards saw 
him again in the yamen at Canton. I felt and wrote bitterly 
about this man at the time, for he was a new specimen to< me, 
and I expected truthfulness and loyalty which were really vir- 
tues outside his ken. It was an immense relief to start off 
again with Pere Vial to do the talking, and not to feel the 
sensation of helplessness which comes of being doubtful as to 
whether one is being deceived or not. 

We soon found out the mystery of the two roads. Li-si-tai 
had closed the old road, where the Kachyens had levied toll 
on travellers, and had opened a new one, after executing sev- 
eral Kachyen chiefs. As a consequence the Kachyens were 
murdering anyone who came their way from China. This was 
a cheerful prospect for us, but we were fairly desperate. We 
reached the nadir of our miseries when, in our journey through 
the Kachyen country, we landed at a village where the chief 
was absent. We had a recommendation of some sort to this 
chief and hoped to find him friendly, but his wife, knowing 
nothing of us, was doubtful and would not sell us anything 
to eat. We were therefore detained in the communal hut 
which, like all Kachyen buildings, was pitch dark inside, hav- 
ing no windows. It was not pleasant to sleep there, because 
one's throat might be cut at any moment before one could see 
an assailant. We had nothing to read, nothing to eat but rice, 
and we had arrived at the stage when rice without condiments 
was so repulsive to us that we would have starved rather 
than eat it. Poor Wahab, indeed, could not digest it. It rained 



I EXPLORE SOUTHERN CHINA 59 

steadily, and we sat in the black hut with gnawing insides and 
ears strained for the footstep of a possible assassin. 

After two or three days — I don't think it was more, but 
it seemed centuries — the chief came back, and after a good 
deal of suspense was pleased to be friendly to us and consented 
to take us to Bhamo for a consideration. His wife prepared a 
dish of vegetables with chillies, upon which we fell with fam- 
ished eagerness. Another nightmare of riding down slippery 
tracks and fording swollen streams, of nights spent in vain 
attempts to sleep, tormented by sand-flies, and of food which 
had no savour even when we were almost starving — at last 
we reached Bhamo and the unspeakable luxury of a house 
owned by American missionaries — Mr. and Mrs. Roberts. They 
said, later on, that three more disreputable-looking loafers had 
never crossed their sight. We wore straw sandals and ragged 
trousers tied with string, dirty, ragged flannel shirts, unkempt 
hair, and disreputable Yunnanese straw hats. Never, never 
shall I forget the sensation of getting into a real tub of hot 
water with plenty of soap and bath towels to get dry with — 
it was the first real bath since we left Canton six months be- 
fore ! Then we sat down to a table laid with spotless linen and 
decked with dainties — bread, butter, jam, and milk — such as 
we had dreamed of for months. I must mention here that 
twenty-two years after this I met the kind lady of this feast 
in a small American town in New York State (where I was 
a chance visitor) to which she had come home, only a few 
years before, for the education of her children. We stayed 
at Bhamo with Mr. Stevenson, of the China Inland Mission, 
who shared his house, his clothes, and his slender purse with 
us, enabling us to pay off the Kachyen chief. I wallowed in 
luxury for a few days but poor Wahab got worse, and the 
cook and Akiu were now both ill. Fortunately I had somewhat 
recovered and was pretty well when we started off down the 
Irrawaddy on a steamboat. I recollect that I didn't want to 
look at scenery or anything — only to rest! At Mandalay I 
felt myself at home once more, among the Burmese faces and 
ways "to which I was so well accustomed. Here we stayed 
three days to get another steamer for Rangoon, and we bade 
good-bye to Pere Vial after I had arranged for paying his 
expenses through Bishop Bourdon. My good friend the Pere 
waited on for a better season before returning to Chu-tung, 



60 DAN TO BEERSHEBA 

which I hope he reached with less danger and fatigue than it 
had cost us to leave it. I believe he is still at his work in 
Southern China. 

We went all the way to Rangoon by steamer, as Wahab was 
too ill to be taken by train from Prome as we had intended. 
At Rangoon the senior civil surgeon, Dr. Griffiths, most kindly 
took him to his own house, where he had every care and at- 
tention, while the servants went into hospital. Dr. Grif- 
fiths could not save poor Wahab's life, but he helped to save 
mine subsequently. In 1894 I was taken suddenly ill and from 
my rooms in London I sent him a message, as he was in Eng- 
land at the time. He came at once, found me at a critical 
stage, and brought in the specialist who was able to deal suc- 
cessfully with my case. After I had placed Wahab with this 
kind doctor I waited a week or so to look after my friend, and 
at last he was better and was sent to Calcutta en route for 
home. He started off again, apparently much recovered, but 
partly owing to his own imprudence he had a relapse and died 
in the Suez Canal. He was the pluckiest and most patient of 
comrades, despite his ill-health on the journey, and never once 
wanted to turn back, but I am afraid he did not value his life 
sufficiently. 

I went home first-class — I felt like "doing myself well" ! 
When I got home I found myself quite a lion — if only a very 
little lion ! My father treated me almost like an equal — indeed, 
there was nothing good enough for me. One of my first visits 
was to Colonel Yule, who was delighted with my success, and 
he and Sir Henry Rawlinson, my father's old friend, moved 
that the gold medal of the Royal Geographical Society — the 
traveller's cordon bleu — should be given to me. It was ac- 
corded me in 1884, on which occasion, as I was absent from 
England, Sir Arthur Phayre kindly received it for me and 
gave it to Colonel Yule who took it to my father who was un- 
able himself to attend. Up to this point they had not met, 
and my father, hearing only that a gentleman had called to 
see him, somehow took it into his head that Yule was a mis- 
sionary who had called for a subscription. A very funny 
scene followed between the two old men, which terminated 
by Colonel Yule sitting down angrily — and heavily — on a fa- 
vourite cat of father's ! 

This, however, is anticipation. I was in London during 



I EXPLORE SOUTHERN CHINA 61 

the autumn and winter of 1882, preparing my book "Across 
Chryse," which was published in April, 1883, by Sampson 
Low. Meeting Sir Henry Stanley one evening at a dinner at 
Sir Edwin Arnold's, he gave me a piece of advice which I 
ought to have taken — and didn't. "Sell the book outright 
for £500, if you can get it," was his advice, and under the 
circumstances, as I was a tyro in bookmaking and was only 
in England for a short time and knew nothing about publish- 
ing, this was sound advice. I did not take it, and "Across 
Chryse" never brought me a penny, although it was a "gold 
medal" book and was translated into several languages. It 
was undoubtedly a very expensive book to produce, for it has 
thumb-nail sketches on every page and three hundred illus- 
trations from original drawings and photographs. The preface 
to "Across Chryse" — a terribly learned and ponderous affair — 
was written by Terrien de Lacouperie. When I first knew 
him he was a man of independent means who had collected a 
library and devoted himself to the study of oriental ethnology 
and history. Having lost all his money by some misfortune 
he came to London with his wife and a few books, and estab- 
lishing himself in a modest menage (entirely run by his ad- 
mirable wife) he made a hard fight against the most grinding 
poverty. Science is rarely a good pay-mistress, and he did 
not know how to popularise. Yule and other orientalists were 
interested in him and I think he had an appointment at the 
London University. He was glad to write the preface (which 
remains an authoritative piece of work to this day) for the 
small sum I could afford to offer. 

If "Across Chryse" brought me no money, it was profitable 
in other ways. Lord Salisbury, who seldom accorded such 
favours to travellers but who was deeply interested in the 
question of railway communications, sent for me and had a 
long conversation in which I was much struck with his knowl- 
edge of the subject. As Lord Cranborne (when Secretary 
of State for India), he had sanctioned two surveys for a route 
between Burma and South-West China, at the instance of the 
mercantile community in Great Britain, but these surveys were 
never made, on the first occasion because the Viceroy of India 
feared complications, and on the second by reason of a change 
of Government at home. Unfortunately for Great Britain's 



62 DAN TO BEERSHEBA 

position in the Far East Lord Salisbury's interests, after he 
became Foreign Secretary, were gradually absorbed in the 
maelstrom of European affairs, and he became not only more 
cautious but indifferent towards the course of events in the 
Far East. The result of this later policy, which it was my task 
for many years to oppose with all my power, will be referred 
to later on. 

Perhaps the proudest moment of my first little triumph was 
reached when I got a letter from Mr. John Macdonald of the 
Times, and was asked by him if I would go to Tongking as 
Times correspondent. The veneration in which I and all my 
friends held the greatest of all newspapers made it the highest 
honour to be chosen to represent it. The pay and allowances 
seemed to me princely, and for the first time in my life I had 
money enough and to spare. I had been given an extra six 
months' leave already, and now I was "seconded" — the all-pow- 
erful Times was not refused when it asked for my services — 
and I started off for Indo-China in the early summer of 1883. 
During the eight months I was at home I had also managed 
to address many leading Chambers of Commerce, in connection 
with the question of surveying a trade route from Burma to 
China, and was promised support by them. As a result of 
this Mr. Holt Hallett was sent out to make surveys of the 
projected line. 

Before closing this chapter on my exploration of Southern 
China I may repeat that, thinking it over in the light of more 
mature knowledge, I believe that with an English interpreter 
I could have carried out my original plan, and completed a 
route which has never since been covered, and which I still 
believe to have had great possibilities. With our slender re- 
sources and the many things against us we were severely 
handicapped, but we covered some 1,300 miles of survey of 
new ground, and of course marched considerably more. We 
were practically the first unofficial explorers in Southern China, 
and the fact that neither of us had any previous experience 
of the country was much against us. The French official ex- 
pedition, whose route at one point crossed ours, lost Doudart 
de Lagre, Gamier and de Carne, while Henri Mouhot perished 
in the same work of exploration in Indo-China. To their 
memory, and to that of my friend Charles Wahab who bore 



I EXPLORE SOUTHERN CHINA 63 

the burden and heat of the day with me but did not live to 
reap the reward, I dedicated my first book "Across Chryse." 
I cannot close this chapter on the note of my own success when 
I remember how many who did more to deserve it fell by the 
wayside. R.I.P. 



CHAPTER VIII 

THE FAR EAST IN PEACE AND WAR 

L'affaiee Tonkinois is now a matter of past history, 
though as I write come echoes of it in the shape of "frontier 
incidents" between France and China. In 1883, however, very 
little was known of the country and its history, and the enter- 
prise of France in that region was a matter of bewilderment 
to Europe. It was to clear up some of this haze that I was 
sent out, and in August, 1883, I despatched home from Co- 
lombo a description and history of the country, which was 
the first really detailed and authentic account to reach Europe. 
For reasons which will appear I sent it by wire, and it con- 
stituted a record at the time, containing 8,000 words. I must 
mention that my agreement with the Times (which was no 
formal "agreement" but a mere verbal commission from John 
Macdonald) gave me carte blanche in the matter of expenses — 
entertaining being a recognised item — as well as a handsome 
salary which was paid into my bank in London and which I 
never touched till my return. I was not expected to give any 
account of the sums disbursed — just a statement of the monthly 
total. These were palmy days for the special correspondent! 
I owed my selection for this post not only to my exploration 
but to my acquaintance with Siam and Burma, and to the 
policy, of which I had already become the advocate, of a for- 
ward movement on our part in Indo-China to secure our pre- 
dominance in Eastern Asia against the growing influence of 
France and Russia. 

As soon as I arrived at Haiphong, the principal town at the 
mouth of the delta, I determined to make arrangements by 
which I could get all over the country as quickly as possible. 
As the delta is intersected with waterways a launch was my 
best method, but there was only one to be had. Thanks to my 
credit, I was able to secure it from its owner, a well-known 



THE FAR EAST IN PEACE AND WAR 65 

character, "old Roche of Saigon." I was joined by another 
correspondent, Gilder of the New York Herald, and our so- 
ciety was completed by an Italian skipper who drank vermouth 
all day long and fed us on sardines, macaroni and anchovies — 
stimulating but not very wholesome. I found the French posi- 
tion by no means enviable. The delta which formed their 
sphere of operations is of rich soil brought down by the river, 
which the natives know by several names but is called by the 
Chinese the Songkoi and by the French Fleuve Rouge, on ac- 
count of its colour. Like the delta at the mouth of the Irra- 
waddy, this part of Tongking is fast encroaching on the sea. 
Two centuries ago the Dutch and Portuguese factories at 
Hungyen — now thirty miles inland — were on the coast, and 
Hanoi, the capital, was a seaport in the eighth century. The 
soil is extremely fertile but the climate hot, damp and un- 
healthy, and I found the military hospitals of the French full 
to overflowing. As for the natives, the Annamese — a feeble, 
effeminate race, armed only with pitchforks, old rifles or sticks 
— had offered little opposition to the French. In Tongking the 
trading population was almost entirely Chinese, many of the 
firms being offshoots from Hong Kong, and a little higher up 
the river there were the Chinese pirates, or Black Flags, who 
offered the only really formidable resistance to the French ad- 
vance. The Black Flags had originally been outlawed by the 
Chinese, but having been called in by the Annamese to oppose 
the French they fought so stoutly that the Chinese encouraged 
them — unofficially at first but later without disguise. 

My observations in Tongking led me to several conclusions, 
which I will give as briefly as possible. First, the aims of 
France were antagonistic to British interests ; second, she had 
got a harder nut to crack than she imagined; and third, the 
game would not seem worth the candle to the majority of 
Frenchmen. Accordingly I contributed to the Times letters 
and telegrams which dispersed a good deal of the polite fiction 
kept up by M. Ferry and his party as to the objects of their 
little "punitive expedition" and its trifling character — a mere 
"military promenade" with no ulterior motive save obtaining 
redress for the death of brave Frenchmen. My difficulty was 
to get off my account in time to influence the debate in the 
French chambers which was shortly to take place. For the 
purpose no brief telegram was sufficient, but a really carefully 



66 DAN TO BEERSHEBA 

reasoned description from the mass of first-hand material I 
had accumulated. I therefore took my "stuff," embarked on 
the first steamer leaving Hong Kong, and in the time which 
elapsed before we reached Colombo had written a small book 
on Tongking. Owing to the bad feeding and climate while 
on the launch I was covered with boils, and could neither sit 
or lie with any comfort nor leave my cabin. Plastered with 
poultices I sat in my sweltering cabin and worked doggedly 
at my task. When it was done it had to be boiled down 
again, and that completed I was able at Colombo to send it at 
the low Indian press rates to Calcutta, where the Times had 
a lien on the wire to Europe. I have often laughed to think 
of the face of the telegraph operator at Colombo when I handed 
in my 8,000 word wire. He could hardly have been more 
astonished had I emulated Gordon Bennett in one of his jour- 
nalistic coups when, desiring to retain possession of the wire 
for an emergency and to keep it occupied, he handed in the 
New Testament with directions to "go on with it." 

Naturally the effect of the attitude of the Times was to 
modify the enthusiasm of the French. My own proposal for 
the settlement of the difficulty was the establishment of a 
neutral zone between the French and Chinese spheres, and the 
opening of the Red River to international trade. As a matter 
of fact the river proved, by later exploration, to be unnavi- 
gable, but the principle would have been established. Unfor- 
tunately for my scheme, China became inflated with the idea 
that Europe was on her side against France, and changed her 
demands to the whole of Tongking, the delta and the treaty 
ports. The French answer to this was the taking of Sontay, 
after two days' heavy fighting with the Black Flags, and the 
capture of Bacninh in March, 1884. By this time French war 
correspondents had arrived in shoals. Mr. (now Sir) J. G. 
Scott, the able author of "The Burman : his Life and Notions," 
went out with me as my assistant at first, but soon joined the 
Daily News. He, Gilder, Cameron of the Standard, and my- 
self formed a little confraternity, and we were a weather- 
beaten quartette; but the new arrivals turned up in spotless 
kit, exquisite helmets with flowing green veils, lemon-coloured 
kid gloves, shining cameras and heaps of note-books, field 
glasses and other impedimenta. We were not popular origi- 
nally with French headquarters, but the arrival of our con- 



THE FAR EAST IN PEACE AND WAR 67 

freres put our noses still more out of joint, and we had to put 
up with a good deal of annoyance in consequence. Under 
the peculiar conditions of French opinion it was natural that 
the commanders of the expedition desired to send home only 
such news as should be at once reassuring and inspiring — a 
combination of brilliant little victories with a low mortality 
among the French. The difficulties at Sontay were therefore 
under-estimated, and at Bacninh, where the French advanced 
in three columns, making a converging movement, and at 
length '"rushing" the place, they found nothing inside but a 
few old men, some women, and a mule or two. Yet political 
exigencies — not vainglory — turned this into a victory and a 
"capture." Now, our business was to tell the truth and shame 
anyone who didn't like it. General Negrier, who was our 
friend, won unpopularity by himself inclining to the belief 
that truth was the best policy. 

My first letter about Tongking — written, of course, before 
war was supposed to have begun — was not viewed with favour 
by the colonial party in France, who pooh-poohed my assertion 
that their designs did not stop short at Tongking alone but 
extended over the southern provinces of China and Siam. 
Wild as this may seem, it was actually the programme of de 
Carne and others, the protagonists of the Empire Indo-Chi- 
noise. My next offence of any moment was a letter, written 
on January 29th, 1884, and appearing in the Times of March 
13th, which described the taking of Sontay. I went over the 
ground a few days after with a French officer who had taken 
part in it, and had the description from his lips. The Black 
Flags made a splendid resistance, and the French troops and 
Turcos were beaten back time after time. One of the Black 
Flags, who had been told off to stand between a stockade and 
the city wall near a gateway, held his post, although the firing 
around him and the dropping shells had destroyed the masonry 
behind him. He stood his ground with a Winchester repeating 
rifle and a cartridge belt, rilling and firing steadily, and drop- 
ping a man with nearly every shot. He was killed in the act 
of taking aim. The French, with their usual chivalry, recog- 
nised his gallantry by giving him a soldier's grave where he 
fell, all the other dead being heaped into one trench. 

I have one more "correspondent" story of this period. Our 
fraternity of three — Gilder, Cameron and myself — pledged 



68 DAN TO BEERSHEBA 

ourselves when we left Tongking to take no advantage of each 
other but to despatch our telegrams simultaneously. When 
Gilder and I were getting into Hong Kong we missed Cam- 
eron, who had slipped over the side and gone ashore. As we 
made our way to the telegraph office Cameron came out, look- 
ing rather sheepish, but we greeted him blandly. Going inside 
I asked : "Oh, by the way, has Mr. Cameron given his message 
yet?" The reply was what we had expected — The clerk was 
just about to attend to it. "Wait a moment," I said, and at 
lightning speed I dashed off an epitome of my original report, 
and told him to send it "express" which costs treble rates but 
takes precedence of' everything but Government despatches. 
The telegram in question stated that the French were now dis- 
cussing the occupation of Amoy, and I added that the authori- 
ties at Haiphong would no longer forward my messages. The 
Times was able to get this out in a second edition on the day 
it was despatched, and a day before Cameron's wire appeared 
in the Standard. Poor Cameron, who did splendid service 
for the Standard, and was such a keen correspondent that his 
temporary lapse from our bargain must not be thought too 
much of, lost his life, like several other distinguished corre- 
spondents, in the Soudan. The record of his work between 
1880 and 1885 is an illustration of the sort of life a war corre- 
spondent led in those days. He was at the battle of Maiwand 
(Afghanistan) in 1880, was taken prisoner by the Boers at 
Majuba next year, witnessed the bombardment of Alexandria 
in 1882, and after a lot of less important work was killed at 
Abu Klea in 1885. 

My friend Gilder was one of the most powerful men I ever 
met and had a cast-iron frame. On the Schwatka expedition, 
in 1878, to search for the remains of Franklin, he made a 
record sleigh journey — over 3,200 miles. In 1881 he was again 
in the Polar regions, in the search for the Jeannette, and after 
his ship (the Rodgers) was burnt made a mid-winter journey 
across Siberia from the Behring Straits. He belonged to a 
distinguished American literary family, and his brother was 
(and I think still is) editor of Scribner's Magazine. 

From Hong Kong (as there seemed nothing special for me 
to do) I wired that I was coming home unless directions to 
stay reached me. These were actually sent, but somehow 
missed me, and I arrived back in London only to be sent out 



THE FAR EAST IN PEACE AND WAR 69 

again at once. From this time for some months I made my 
headquarters at Hong Kong, living at Stonehenge, a bachelor 
"chummery" where lived my friend Stewart Lockhart and 
other kindred spirits. The chummery of the China side is both 
economical and extremely comfortable, thanks to the genius 
of the Chinese for service. Stonehenge was very hospitable, 
and our Sunday morning breakfasts were a great institution — 
the discussions were as hot as the mulligatawny soup and dry 
curry, and that is saying a good deal. 

It may be mentioned that in my letters I commented strongly 
on the policy which, at such a critical time, left Hong Kong 
(whose defences were perfectly obsolete) without the protec- 
tion of a British fleet. There was a riot at Canton, a war in 
Tongking, and the fleet was sent for a two months' cruise 
round Japan and Korea! 

Meanwhile / 'affaire Tonkinois was taking some unexpected 
turns. Perhaps no war between two great nations had more 
comic and paradoxical situations. For one thing, the fighting 
was going on for a year before war was declared! Then the 
advent to power in Peking of the "war party" led to a cessation 
of hostilities. A treaty was signed in hot haste by Li Hung 
Chang and Commandant Fournier, the latter being raised by 
telegram to the rank of Plenipotentiary to admit of this. The 
two negotiators fell into each other's arms! This denouement 
was brought about quite "accidental like" by my friend Mr. 
Detring, Commissioner of Customs at Canton, since then at 
Tientsin. Detring is a German, and is one of the men behind 
the scenes who make history. We shall meet him again. In 
this case he met Fournier while on a passage in a French 
cruiser from Hong Kong to Canton. They patched the thing 
up between them in a few hours' talk, Fournier knowing that 
his principals were only too anxious for a settlement, while 
Detring was equally aware of the Chinese frame of mind and 
had considerable influence with Li Hung Chang. I was able 
to get the terms of this treaty in advance, and having the ear- 
liest possible notice of its signature the Times came out with 
it before the details reached Paris. Immediately after this 
"treaty" had been signed war broke out in earnest! Colonel 
Duguenne, acting under a misapprehension, advanced towards 
Langson and was repulsed and driven back. Many accounts 
were given of this incident, but the facts here summarised 



70 DAN TO BEERSHEBA 

are the true ones. The Chinese commander said that no orders 
to evacuate had reached him, whereas Duguenne had been 
told that the treaty provided for the occupation of the frontier 
towns. The collision might have been avoided but for the 
curious fact that the French had no proper interpreter, so that 
the Chinese commander's letter asking for time could not be 
translated. After this disaster to the French many attempts 
were made to patch up peace, but with no avail, yet for a time 
a suspension of hostilities took place. 

During this truce Admiral Courbet entered the Min River, 
passing the forts at its mouth, and anchored inside. On the 
resumption of hostilities Courbet took advantage of his position 
to shell the arsenal at Foochow and sink the Chinese fleet. I 
was staying with our Vice-Consul Mr. (now Sir Pelham) 
Warren, close by the arsenal, and although he had had notice 
from the French admiral that it would be advisable to leave, 
he declined, in his usual imperturbable manner, to make a 
move. We dined and smoked comfortably, and the admiral, 
who did not want to shell us, sent several urgent messages. 
People who know my friend Pelham Warren will believe me 
when I say that he was not to be hurried, but eventually about 
midnight, with his eyeglass screwed firmly in his eye, he started 
for the quay. It was pitch dark, and we had some difficulty 
in getting off to the flagship of Admiral Dowell, which was 
there keeping an eye on the French. Next afternoon, however, 
when the shells began to burst we saw enough. 

My telegram to the Times of August 23rd, written on board 
H.M.S. Champion, says: "The bombardment was a sickening 
business — no fight, a massacre. The Chinese fleet consisted 
of eleven light river and coast transports — mere toys. The 
French had eight heavily armed ships." The Chinese gun- 
boats had swung with the tide and were not even able to return 
the fire, nor could the forts reply, since the French ships had 
passed them and were in their rear. When the Chinese boats 
sank, the French fired at the men struggling in the water. The 
bombardment of the town and the arsenal (which, as Li Hung 
Chang bitterly reflected, was "the creation of French genius") 
was continued for two hours after every sign of resistance 
was over. I was the only newspaper correspondent present, 
having gone up the river with a despatch for the English ad- 
miral, and immediately firing was over I proceeded down again 



THE FAR EAST IN PEACE AND WAR 71 

in a sampan, at some risk from the burning junks and disabled 
gunboats which threatened to foul us. The river was full of 
bodies and the scene was really a horrible one. It must, of 
course, be mentioned that the action of Courbet on the Min 
River met with little approbation from a people whose tradi- 
tions of chivalry to an enemy are proverbial. 

Some time in October or November I heard that the French, 
who realised that their victories in Formosa had really very 
little effect on the Chinese, were planning a descent on Port 
Arthur. I may mention that my sources of information, both 
now and later, were very varied. I had friends in all camps — 
the mercantile community, who through their compradores are 
in close touch with Chinese feeling, the British officials at 
Hong Kong and Canton many of whom spoke Chinese, and 
last but not least the Viceroy and his many hangers-on and 
friends, both Chinese and European, with whom I was on 
intimate terms. Sometimes I even got a hint from French 
sources, and altogether I was in a position to gauge the situa- 
tion with considerable accuracy. Although I had doubts about 
the Port Arthur scheme I thought the best way to test it was 
to act as though I believed in it, and therefore went up at 
once to Chefoo and thence, by special permission of the Vice- 
roy, I took a Chinese gunboat to Port Arthur. I was consid- 
erably surprised at what I found there. A few months before, 
on the conclusion of the Li-Fournier treaty, a number of 
French officers had visited the fortress and were kindly al- 
lowed to take photographs ! Immediately after their departure, 
however, the defences were transformed, and although by no 
means the impregnable fortress of later times Port Arthur 
was already very strongly fortified. A German artillery officer, 
Major von Hannaken, had the work in charge, and took me 
all ever it under a promise of secrecy. He told me he could 
hold out there, if properly provisioned, for an indefinite time, 
and both then and subsequently I formed the impression, 
strengthened by the late war, that Port Arthur is really im- 
pregnable from a strategic point of view, if defended to the 
utmost of its capacity. Von Hannaken, by the way, had an 
extraordinary escape later on, at the outbreak of the Chino- 
Japanese war, being on board the Kow siting when she was 
sunk by the Japanese before war had been declared. The 
Kowshing was carrying troops, and when they were struggling 



J2 DAN TO BEERSHEBA 

in the water the Japanese fired on them. Von Hannaken, a 
powerful swimmer, was able to reach the coast in a state of 
great exhaustion and escaped, but the majority of his com- 
panions perished. 

Courbet could, in my opinion, have done little at Port Ar- 
thur, but as a matter of fact his Government would not let him 
try. They said they wished to save the prestige of "notre ami 
Li Hung Chang." It was after this that they developed their 
really effective policy of blocking the grain trade, and so re- 
duced the Chinese to desire peace at any price. 

The conclusion of the Franco-Chinese War was as singular 
as its whole conduct. A second check administered to the 
French troops at Langson, and the wounding of General 
Negrier, disheartened the French, but before this happened 
the Empress-Dowager, in a paroxysm of fear, had given or- 
ders for peace at any price. Before the news of Langson had 
reached either Peking or Paris, therefore, peace had been 
patched up in a most irregular way. The proper agents were, 
of course, the duly accredited Minister in London and Paris, 
Marquis Tseng, and his chancellor Halliday Macartney, but 
the Empress-Dowager chose to confide her fears to Sir Robert 
Hart, and he communicated to his agent, Mr. Campbell, then 
in Paris, who thereupon became the negotiator between the 
two Powers. Before Langson happened the treaty was prac- 
tically concluded, but formal ratification had not come from 
Peking. 

At this point M. Ferry had to meet the French Chamber 
with the news of the disaster at Langson, and he had two 
courses open to him. Either he must announce the treaty and 
the end of the war or he must ask for a credit to continue his 
operations. In the first place he would run the risk that the 
Empress-Dowager in the flush of victory might repudiate her 
irregular agents and the treaty, in which case Ferry himself 
would become the laughing-stock of Europe, or he would have 
to face the music of asking for means to prosecute an unpopu- 
lar war at a moment when his personal prestige was at zero. 
He had held office for two years — longer than any President 
since the Empire — but the wave of political reaction was 
threatening, and he had the clericals against him on the one 
hand, because of his educational policy, and on the other the 
radicals and socialists who opposed the war. Faced with the 



THE FAR EAST IN PEACE AND WAR 73 

two alternatives Ferry chose — and chose wrong. He de- 
manded a credit of two hundred millions of francs for con- 
tinuing the war — an entirely inadequate sum if the campaign 
had really been carried on. The credit was refused, the min- 
istry resigned, and Ferry escaped through the streets filled 
with an angry mob anxious to lynch him or throw him into 
the Seine. Blowitz wrote to the Times: "The French when 
visited with affliction discover a victim. Englishmen did not 
overthrow the Gladstone cabinet when Khartoum fell." He 
attributed the movement against Ferry not only to the war 
but to the inevitable tendencies of the bureaucratic system. 
"It used to be said that every soldier had a marshal's baton 
in his knapsack. Now that 200 ministers and under-secre- 
taries have been used up every year every Frenchman is born 
with a portfolio under his arm !" The prospective minister 
was always attacking the present one. Clemenceau, in a fa- 
mous speech, even declared: "I see before me not ministers 
but accused persons!" 

In short, Ferry fell with the document in his pocket which 
might have saved his credit as far as the war was concerned, 
for the Empress-Dowager never had the slightest desire to 
repudiate it, being seized with an attack of panic. He fell 
never to rise again. His fall was the result of political com- 
binations, but to the public mind it was identified with defeat 
in Tongking, and at the funeral celebrations of Hippolyte Car- 
not (father of the President) in 1888 Ferry had to be rescued 
from the fury of the crowd, which called out "a bas Ferry ! a 
bas le Tonkinois !" Ferry was a genuine statesman, and there 
was no one of the same calibre to replace him. He declared 
proudly "Je revendique fierement le titre de Tonkinois dont 
les mechants et les sots croient me faire un outrage." His 
opposition to Boulanger, whom he christened "the St. Armand 
of the cafe concert," accentuated his unpopularity at a time 
when that pinchbeck hero was the idol of the public. Ferry 
died in 1893. 

Time brings it revenges. In 1906 the French were erecting 
a monument to him in the Tuileries, and his colonial policy 
was considered to have more than justified itself. At this junc- 
ture appeared the memoirs of General Andre, in which slight- 
ing reference was made to the Langson incident and to the 
retreat of General Negrier. A challenge was the result, and 



74 DAN TO BEERSHEBA 

one morning the two old soldiers faced each other across a 
grass plot in a garden at the back of the Hotel Murat. Negrier, 
the figure of a French nobleman of the old regime, faced his 
adversary with supreme contempt. Andre had the first shot. 
He raises a trembling hand, fires — and misses. It is now the 
turn of General Negrier. Raising his hat courteously he 
hands his pistol to his second and remarks that he has no 
intention of firing, whereupon his adversary, less self-controlled, 
throws his hands into the air with an exclamation of rage. 
The honours of the day remained with Negrier, and more- 
over the following morning L 'Eclair published a statement 
to the effect that Negrier had actually questioned the order of 
his superior, Briere de Lisle, as to an advance which he ex- 
pected to fail. The reply came : "The order comes from 
France!" after which Negrier could only go on to defeat, and 
was himself seriously wounded. His second in command, 
Colonel d'Herbinger, who ordered the retreat, was court- 
martialled and fully exonerated. Negrier had kept silence on 
the subject for twenty years, which was quite in keeping with 
his character as a soldier and a gentleman. This was the epi- 
logue to the strange tragi-comedy of the Franco-Chinese War, 
which, as my friend the late A. Michie wrote, was in the 
breach of the peace a historical curiosity and in the even- 
tual settlement a dramatic extravaganza. 

During the time I acted as Times correspondent in the Far 
East I was "seconded" from Government service for close 
•on two years. I did a good deal of moving about, visiting 
Formosa, Japan several times, the Yangtze valley, and all 
the China and Indo-China coast ports. While China was occu- 
pied with her war with France Japan took the opportunity to 
question her supremacy in Korea, and thus was taken the first 
step towards that Japanese expansion which is to-day the 
most important factor in the Far East. With events in North- 
ern China, however, it was not my province to deal, although 
I made it my business to be acquainted with them. I made 
many friends and acquaintances on "the China side," and al- 
though time has changed much I could still go back and drop 
into a pleasantly familiar society — the most hospitable in the 
world. I found time to run down to Siam, to meet Mr. Holt 
Hallett, who was conducting the survey for a railway between 
Burma and Yunnan for which funds had been subscribed by 



THE FAR EAST IN PEACE AND WAR 75 

the leading Chambers of Commerce on my initiative. Hallett 
also came round to see me when he had finished his survey, 
and accompanied me to Port Arthur and up the Yangtze val- 
ley. In the autumn of 1885 I went home, and peace was de- 
clared between France and China on November 28. Through 
the courtesy of the Marquis Tseng I was able to get the first 
information of the terms of the final treaty, by which France 
secured Tongking and the Sonkoi River. 

The frontier zone between France and China is still a sort 
of no-man's land, and serious questions have arisen in connec- 
tion with it quite recently, but the entire change which has 
come over the East since the time of which I am writing 
makes the problem a very different one. In the midst of the 
shattered hopes and plans of other European nations the 
French have persisted in their slow but sure advance towards 
Southern China. The Red River proving unnavigable they 
have built a railway, which will next year reach Yunnan- fu 
and, if possible, will be extended to the Upper Yangtze. The 
policy of Jules Ferry is justified — or will be, when the rich 
provinces of Southern China are eventually opened to French 
trade. 



CHAPTER IX 

A CAMPAIGN AT HOME 

It has been mentioned that during my two years' spe- 
cial correspondence for the Times I found opportunity to run 
down to Siam and see how Hallett was getting on with the 
surveys for our projected railway. During my short stay in 
England in 1882-83 I had addressed a number of the Cham- 
bers of Commerce on the possibilities of a trade route between 
Burma and China, and as a result they and the Government of 
Singapore subscribed £3,500 towards the survey which I, how- 
ever, was not able personally to carry out. Application was 
made to the Government of India for another £3,500, and 
was supported by Mr. (afterwards Sir Charles) Bernard, but 
the application was refused. Mr. (later Sir C.) Crosthwaite, 
Chief Commissioner of Burma, endeavoured to secure the 
sum in another quarter — from the Rangoon Port Fund — but 
technical difficulties stood in the way. Hallett therefore pro- 
ceeded to carry out as much of the survey as possible on the 
sum subscribed, and it may be mentioned here that I myself 
paid £500 towards the expenses of the report which was sub- 
sequently issued by Hallett and myself in 1885. Hallett gave 
his services gratuitously, both in the field and in preparing the 
report, and carried out the work — 1,500 miles of survey and 
2,500 miles of exploration — with great ability. His surveying, 
which was done from the backs of elephants or from boats, 
was so accurate as to be specially commented on by the car- 
tographer of the Royal Geographical Society who plotted the 
surveys. He said he had never seen such work before. Both 
Hallett and the men who accompanied him, including the well- 
known American missionary, Dr. Cushing, suffered consider- 
ably from fever and other complaints, but the work was car- 
ried through with great pluck and endurance. Hallett also 
collected data of all kinds concerning the people of what was 

76 



A CAMPAIGN AT HOME 77 

then an unknown region, including vocabularies of the wilder 
tribes, and these were passed on to Terrien de Lacouperie for 
his recondite studies into Indo-Chinese philology. 

My visit to Siam in 1884 had for its object the enlistment 
of King Chulalongkorn's support for these railway enterprises 
in his own country, or rather to induce him to initiate them. 
Not only did I propose the linking of Siam to British Burma 
by rail, but a portion of my great northern line was to run 
through Siamese territory. The king and his secretary and 
chancellor Prince Devawongtze were genuinely progressive, 
but the former was not very pleased with me for my outspoken 
articles in the Times on Siam's peril. He therefore addressed 
himself chiefly to Hallett, and went over the maps and plans 
we had prepared. I offended him again by my plain speaking. 
Having alluded to the strategic value of railways, he remarked 
loftily that Siam had no need of them, being in no danger, 
whereupon, with a lack of courtliness, I rejoined that France 
on one side and Great Britain on the other constituted perils 
from my point of view ! Chulalongkorn was still to Oriental 
in his ideas to appreciate this bluntness, but I sometimes won- 
der if he has thought of it since. His ultimatum was that, if 
the Government of India would take the first step, he would 
follow, and as a matter of fact such a decision was wise and 
reasonable. Unfortunately for me and for Siam the Govern- 
ment of India was not prepared to accept any responsibilities 
or initiate any policy. 

On my return home in 1885 my railway campaign was prose- 
cuted with vigour. On November 15th Hallett read a report 
of his survey work and exploration in the Siamese Shan States 
before the Royal Geographical Society, after which the Mar- 
quis of Lome as chairman, Colonel Yule and Sir Rutherford 
Alcock spoke in a most eulogistic way of our labours, and 
the chairman of the London Chamber of Commerce testified 
to the interest felt by the mercantile community. The presi- 
dent of the Manchester Chamber wrote : "In our Chamber 
there is a strong feeling that Mr. Colquhoun and Mr. Hallett 
should receive from Her Majesty's Government some recog- 
nition of the services they have rendered to the commerce of 
the country." I quote this because it has always been a source 
of pleasure to me that our efforts, however unavailing, were 
recognised and supported by the community in whose interests 



78 DAN TO BEERSHEBA 

they were made. About twenty of the leading Chambers of 
Commerce memorialised the Government in this sense, and some 
of them did so two or three times, and for several years con- 
tinued to repeat their memorials. The impotence of the Cham- 
bers, not only in this but in far more important matters, lay 
in their isolation. Had they been organised into some cor- 
porate form their voice would have been heard. As it was, 
the memorials were doubtless noted, filed and pigeon-holed, 
and neither the Chambers, nor we, even heard any more about 
the matter. As I have already said, I had the privilege of 
paying i50O out of my own pocket for the voluminous report 
which contained the results of our work, including as it did 
a collection of elaborate maps, surveys and diagrams. 

At this time I was also busy on my second book, "Amongst 
the Shans," published by Field and Tuer in 1885, prefaced 
by the monograph on "The Cradle of the Shan Race," by 
Terrien de Lacouperie, to which I have already referred. Hal- 
lett wrote a historical summary, which was added at the end, 
and the volume is completed by a selection of Press notices 
regarding my work and the railway, which are curious reading 
to-day. I find speeches by Lord Northbrook, Sir Thomas 
Wade, Sir Arthur Phayre and others, but nothing either they 
or I had to say was more emphatic than the pronouncement 
of Lord Salisbury as far back as 1867, when he wrote in a 
despatch to the Government of India: "I am unable to concur 
in the reasons which allow you 'to deprecate even the probable 
expenditure which a preliminary survey of the country would 
involve.' . . . Looking at these opinions (Sir Arthur 
Phayre's) and bearing in mind the enormous advantages which 
have resulted from the establishment of communications in 
cases where a far smaller amount of traffic had previously ex- 
isted, I retain the opinion that both in the interests of British 
Burma and England, this survey should be carried forward." 

It must not be supposed that the Burmo-Chinese railway was 
my only preoccupation. During mv visits to Indo-China I 
had become imbued with the idea, of which Hallett had proofs 
gathered in his journeys, that the ambitions of France stretched 
further than Siam, and that there was every chance, unless 
we interfered, that we might see her establishing "a prior 
attachment" in Upper Burma. Information on this head of a 
conclusive character afterwards reached the Indian Govern- 



A CAMPAIGN AT HOME 79 

ment from an Italian gentleman who had access, through his 
Burmese friends, to confidential papers and made a nice little 
fortune out of them on which he retired. The death in 1878 
of King Mindon of Burma (a strong and progressive prince) 
led to the accession of Theebaw, one of his sons, who was 
entirely under the influence of his wife, the Supaya Lat, and 
her mother. I have already given some description of King 
Theebaw and his chief wife from people who knew both in 
their childhood. The King was not actually vicious, but had 
evil counsellors. He allowed many of the princes with their 
women folks and high officials to be put to death, in traditional 
oriental fashion, and then proceeded to rule in the most arbi- 
trary and inefficient manner. His outlying provinces were 
much disturbed and the peace of Lower Burma was threatened 
by the misrule on her borders. Bhamo, where I had passed 
in 1882, was taken by Chinese outlaws and only recaptured 
by the Burmese after several months. Theebaw was warned 
by the Indian Government, but was quite impenitent, and sent 
missions to other European Powers with a view to securing 
alliances against Britain. In exchange for promises of arms 
he was prepared to grant monopolies of any kind to foreign 
adventurers, and the French consul, M. Haas, took advantage 
of this frame of mind. A French bank and a French railway 
were among the projects, and both the Ruby Mines and the 
monopoly of let pet (pickled tea) — a most important article of 
food with the Burmese — were to be hypothecated to the French 
in return for loans. Possibly even these alarming projects or 
even their private information would not have spurred the 
Indian Government into action, but Theebaw went too far 
when he imposed a fine of nearly a quarter of a million sterling 
on the Bombay-Burma trading corporation, and refused to 
allow the question to be submitted to arbitration. The repre- 
sentative of this corporation in Burma was Mr. Annan Bryce, 
whose brother (now Ambassador to the United States) was 
one of Gladstone's lieutenants, so that powerful Liberal inter- 
ests were enlisted in favour of some decisive action. I may 
mention here that I knew Annan Bryce and his sisters in their 
home in Glasgow, where their father was principal of the 
High School. James, the elder brother, went up to Oxford 
with a bursary before my time. 

From June, 1885, to January, 1886, a Conservative Govern- 



80 DAN TO BEERSHEBA 

ment was in power, with Lord Randolph Churchill, at the 
zenith of his too-brief career, at the India Office. In 1884, 
previous to the Conservative accession to power, Lord Ripon 
was succeeded in India by Lord Dufferin, so there was some 
hope of a less invertebrate attitude at Calcutta. Lord Ripon, 
on his return home, could not refrain from embarrassing his 
successor by a series of speeches, of the ''avoid responsibility 
at all hazards" order, being supported by Bright on the prin- 
ciple that "lust for territory" must not be indulged, and by 
Morley on similar but more statesmanlike grounds. 

Lord Dufferin had sent an ultimatum to Theebaw on Octo- 
ber 27th, and as that prince refused the terms war was inevi- 
table. On November 9th Lord Salisbury used language which 
left no doubt as to Britain being at war with Burma, and as 
the general election came on at the end of the month it will 
be seen that there had been some reason for the energy with 
which we had urged action upon a Government more likely 
to take our advice than one which would be swayed by Bright, 
Ripon, Morley, and the party to whom no war was ever justi- 
fiable. On November 10th I perpetrated yet another attack 
on Lord Ripon, and said he had always followed the policy 
of "put it off to the latest moment and then half-hearted inter- 
ference." I think I really deserved my Burmese nickname 
of "Blazes," for I was always "blazing" away at someone, and 
at last I had overstepped the mark. 

The audacity of my conduct (for I was still an engineer 
in the service of the Indian Government) in giving such bold 
advice and such severe criticism, and in carrying with me the 
most influential organ of public opinion, which quoted me on 
every occasion as the authority on the subject, drew down 
upon me the disapproval of my superiors, who administered 
a "warning" that I must be more guarded. 

As a matter of fact I had, by my activity in the interests 
of the commercial community, secured a very strong backing 
in the industrial centres, and the Press of Yorkshire, Lan- 
cashire and Scotland were all writing in support of my views. 
Although I was, of course, playing as much as I could into 
the hands of the Conservative Government, and was frequently 
consulted by Lord Randolph, I had the support of an extreme 
Radical like Joe Cowen, of the Newcastle Chronicle, who was 
that rare bird (in those days) the Radical Imperialist. He 



A CAMPAIGN AT HOME 81 

was under surveillance by the foreign police, having at one 
period fomented revolutions on the Continent, and all the revo- 
lutionary fugitives in Europe were guests under his roof and 
often pensioners on his bounty. Joe Cowen was a little, square- 
set man with a massive head, and despite the fact that he was 
educated at Edinburgh University he had a strong Northum- 
brian accent, which told against him in the House but gave 
him a great grip on his own people. The Newcastle Chronicle, 
2l very influential paper under his guidance, yielded to none 
in its jealousy for Imperial honour, and so independent was 
Cowen that, although a Radical, he supported a Tory Govern- 
ment in the Russo-Turkish war and so brought down upon 
himself much wrath from Gladstone. 

My first review article was published in the National Review 
in 1883, and others appeared in 1885. Alfred Austin, who 
was the first leader writer on the Standard, was also editor of 
the National, and I recollect that the cheques I received for 
these articles were signed by Arthur J. Balfour, who was then 
part proprietor of that publication. Other newspaper men 
whom I met were E. B. Iwan-Muller, then on the Manchester 
Courier, Charles Russell, of the Glasgow Herald, and Edmund 
Yates, editor of the World, who made me the subject of one 
of the weekly sketches "Celebrities at Home." This form of 
journalism, not so painfully overdone in those days, was largely 
introduced by Yates and de Blowitz, of whom the former was 
not at all fond. 

It has been my fate to provide copy for a number of inter- 
viewers, and in return for the patience with which I have sub- 
mitted to the infliction I have been described as "possessing 
distinctly Mongolian features" and as being "the good-natured 
ruffian I looked"! On one occasion an interviewer (who ap- 
peared to be educated) asked what I ate in China. I replied, 
quite innocently: "Beef, mutton, fowls, eggs, rice and vege- 
tables." He looked baffled, and then asked what was my usual 
method of travel in China. "Caravan as a rule," I said, get- 
ting rather bored. He seemed to find that interesting and was 
making eager notes, when a lady who assisted at the inter- 
view interposed: "This kind of caravan does not have a yellow 
body and red wheels ; it is composed of mules or camels !" He 
had had a vision of a picturesque procession, with an old brown 
horse jogging along and myself a la gipsy, smoking a pipe on 



82 DAN TO BEERSHEBA 

the front seat, while astonished pig-tailed crowds ran out to 
see me pass ! En passant, one interviewer irritated me par- 
ticularly by this sort of thing. " 'Yes.' replied Mr. Colqu- 
houn, taking a whiff of a fragrant cigarette." . . . Now, as 
I am not a Guardsman, drawn by Ouida, I object to that kind 
of "atmosphere," and as a matter of fact I don't smoke ciga- 
rettes and never did. 

To get back to the World. It is amusing to see an old pic- 
ture of oneself. I find I received the World interviewer in 
my rooms in Old Quebec Street, which contained no curios 
but a litter of books, instruments, maps, and papers. I was 
clad in an Afghan choga, a camel-hair gown with a hood, 
which had been worn by my father in the Afghan war — "had 
clad my father's frame" is the exact expression. I remember 
the choga, which was old and dirty and very comfortable. I 
wish I knew where it has gone to, but, in the years which 
followed, my personal possessions were frequently reduced to 
the clothes I stood up in, and many of those (if my friends 
can be trusted) were borrowed. My father was still alive, 
and I can think of no more eloquent evidence of his pride in 
me than the fact that he had given me his choga. Only one 
thing remains of the objects described by the curious journalist 
— a slab of Tali marble, highly prized by the Chinese, because 
it is veined in the similitude of mountain scenery. I was using 
this as a paper-weight. It hangs on my wall as I write. 

I was only in England for six months from June to Decem- 
ber, 1885. On my way home I had visited Lord DufTerin, to 
whom I was charged with a mission from Li Hung Chang 
concerning the connection of China and India by telegraph. 
This was eventually carried out. I also recommended (I be- 
lieve for the first time) a course which was only followed after 
a number of years — that Indian officers should go to Peking 
and Tokio to learn the languages. 

When later I received the warning not to communicate so 
freely with the Press I felt doubtful whether I could go on 
as a Government servant. I am afraid that the free hand I 
had enjoyed as Times correspondent made me less and less 
inclined to knuckle under to any official regime. The inde- 
pendent spirit which had characterised me as a boy, and of 
which I had never been cured, added to a rather choleric tem- 
perament — which gained me in Burma the nickname "Blazes" 



A CAMPAIGN AT HOME 83 

— really unfitted me constitutionally for the leading-strings 
which are inevitable in Government employ. I consulted Lord 
Randolph Churchill on the subject, and he strongly advised me 
to throw over the service and be a free-lance, and, despite the 
advantages I should have to forego, I should probably have 
acted on this had I not, at this juncture, been posted to Upper 
Burma as Deputy Commissioner. This was not only great 
promotion but it took me into a congenial sphere on the out- 
posts of the Empire, where, I thought, a man would have free- 
dom of action and a life full of adventure and interest. Need- 
less to say, I accepted the post, and December, 1885, saw me 
once more on my way to the East. 

Among my most vivid recollections of this time is a visit 
paid by me to Bear Wood. Although I had been connected 
with the Times for over two years I had only once seen the 
great head of the house, and that when I had been formally 
presented to him by Macdonald at the Times office. John 
Walter was the greatest autocrat I had ever come across, and 
men who feared not kings, and to whom prime ministers were 
of small account, trembled before him. Sir Algernon West 
says of Lord Randolph Churchill that he feared only two men 
— Bismarck and Gladstone. I did not know these giants, but 
in my smaller world I feared only one ! To me he represented 
the greatest power on earth — the chief influence on the most 
powerful organ of opinion of that day. No newspaper before 
or since has held such a position, and for fifty years the head 
of the reigning family which ruled over it was the man who 
was sitting in the landau which came to meet me at the station ! 
My heart bumped against my ribs when I realised the honour 
which had been done me, for John Macdonald himself, to 
whom I had looked up as a sort of minor Jove, had not ex- 
pected such an act of condescension. My impression is that 
Macdonald himself and all the staff were almost as much 
afraid of their great chief as I was. He was a slight, smallish 
man, distinguished in appearance and courtly in manner, and 
by his extreme politeness, added to a somewhat abrupt way 
of speaking, he contrived to keep one at a distance and pre- 
serve his own superiority. I was astonished at Bear Wood, 
as I had not then, in my brief sojourns at home, visited any 
great houses, and in my experience of the magnificence and 
luxury of the East there was nothing to compare with the 



84 DAN TO BEERSHEBA 

stateliness and sober comfort of an English country home. It 
was not a large house party — only myself and Mosely, a leader- 
writer who was connected with the Times for thirty-five years, 
and who was one of the most brilliant and versatile talkers 
I have ever heard, having a marvellous range of information. 
Such a quality was, of course, essential for a leader-writer 
in those days, when specialism was not so usual, and when 
the method of publication permitted a far more studied treat- 
ment of subjects. Nowadays when a wire comes in, perhaps 
between nine and ten o'clock, perhaps even later, and has to 
be embodied in a leader which must be in the printer's hands 
by 11.30 p.m. for despatch by an early morning train, there 
is not much opportunity for carefully reasoned and erudite 
studies in leaders. 

Even in those days, however, leader-writing was more or 
less a matter of habit. I recollect Mr. Buckle, the present 
editor of the Times, telling a story of Alfred Austin, who, 
when staying in a country house, was challenged to prove 
what he had boasted of, that he could write a leader on any 
given subject in fifty minutes. He was given a subject and 
sat down, and a few minutes before the time was up his copy 
was written, neatly divided into three paragraphs with three 
leading motifs all nicely combined at the finish — the classic 
form for "leaders" in this country. During my stay at Bear 
Wood Mr. Walter took me all over the estate himself and 
showed me the models for dwelling-houses for his employees 
and brickfields where the material for the new offices in Print- 
ing House Square were being made. The whole thing seemed 
like a little self-containd world to me, and quite different to 
anything I had previously seen. English country life at that 
time was practically a closed book to me, and it is only of 
recent years that I have seen something of it, as well as of 
life on estates in Bohemia, Hungary, and other parts of the 
Continent. 



CHAPTER X 

IN UPPER BURMA 

The occupation of Mandalay was very easily accomplished, 
partly because the natives were thoroughly dissatisfied with 
Theebaw, and still more so with his better half, the Supaya 
Lat. At first our future course was undetermined, and it 
was quite on the cards that we might put another prince on 
the throne, but as time went on it was evident that no half- 
measures would be really satisfactory. As Lord Dufferin said, 
the first condition for a "buffer" State is that it should have 
some power of resistance — Burma was "too soft and pulpy." 
The first step after the deposition was to divide the country 
into districts and place these under the direct administration 
of deputy commissioners with police officers and a small staff. 
The districts were grouped into four divisions under "com- 
missioners," and the head of the administration was the Chief 
Commissioner (usually known as the C.C.), with headquarters 
at Mandalay. Mandalay itself was under the control of Cap- 
tain Adamson, and the chief police officer there was my friend 
Theo Fforde. The work accomplished by these two was little 
short of heroic, for theirs was a most difficult task. In the 
district we had dacoits to deal with, hard work and danger 
in covering the areas we were expected to control, but in 
Mandalay they had even more difficult material in an educated 
and semi-educated population, the remnants of the bureau- 
cracy, and the great crowd of Court hangers-on who were 
thrown entirely out of a living by the abolition of the old 
regime. The judicial system had to be administered by Adam- 
son and Fforde, and the Times correspondent at Rangoon, 
himself an advocate, commented unfavourably upon the fact 
that prisoners were tried in all sorts of places — private houses, 
boats, anywhere that the Deputy Commissioner happened to 
have time to sit down — and that proper judicial forms were 

85 



86 DAN TO BEERSHEBA 

not observed. It is always easy to criticise in theory the work 
done at high pressure by the man on the spot, and no doubt 
the justice of these early days was rough-and-ready, but some- 
how or another the job was put through. Repeated attempts 
at incendiarism gave a great deal of trouble, a portion of the 
town being destroyed on one occasion, whereby a large number 
of people were rendered homeless, and being out of em- 
ployment, joined the dacoit bands. The hard work of these 
years was undoubtedly largely responsible for the heavy death- 
roll among the civil officers, quite apart from the number of 
men who fell in action. Among the former was Theo Fforde, 
who died in 1888, the second of my great friends who gave 
their lives to the cause of our empire in Indo-China. 

The assistant and deputy commissioners were chosen from 
young men in all branches of Government service in Lower 
Burma, as the regular civil service was not equal to the strain. 
One was a civilian of only four years' standing, another had 
been assistant superintendent of a prison, others were recruited 
(like myself) from the P.W. or Public Works department, and 
one or two were entire outsiders. Mr. (now Sir) J. G. Scott, 
for instance, was a master in the S.P.G. school, but his knowl- 
edge of Burma and the Burmese was exceptional. Fielding 
Hall, the author of a charming and well-known but too idealistic 
book on Burma, "The Soul of a People," was drafted in from 
a trading corporation. The language question was, of course, 
the determining factor in these appointments. The ordinary 
Indian civil servant (except the few already in Lower Burma) 
was ignorant of Burmese, and accordingly our ranks had to 
be filled up from men whose local knowledge was their chief 
qualification, and who had no experience of administration. 
The powers given to these young administrators were neces- 
sarily very great. Death sentences had to be confirmed, but 
below that we had entire jurisdiction, and it was lucky for us 
and for the people we governed that we had such an admirable 
guide as the Indian penal code, which is a model of simplicity 
and efficiency, so that any man of intelligence and common 
sense can administer it. It was, however, a novel experience 
to many of us to be pitchforked into a district as big as Swit- 
zerland, with the assistance of a police officer and a few Sepoys, 
and then to be left to our own devices. Everyone, from Sir 
Charles Bernard downwards, tried to do the work of three 



IN UPPER BURMA 87 

men, for each of us was administrator, judge, jury, commis- 
sioner of works and Lord High Everybody Else. 

My own district, Sagain, was just below Mandalay and op- 
posite Ava, the old capital of the Burmese kings, situated on 
a picturesque bend of the Irrawaddy. I had a Madras native 
regiment to support me, most of the time the 23rd N. I., under 
Colonel Poole, and later a detachment, and then the whole 
second battalion of the Hampshires. At first I had separate 
quarters and messed with the officers, but later on a building 
was put up of which the upper part was my residence and the 
lower the courthouse and offices. In this bungalow I enter- 
tained several distinguished visitors, including Sir Herbert 
Macpherson and the Duke of Montrose. My nephew, Andrew 
Symington, joined me here, and a half-brother also came 
out to me later but could not stand the climate. It was diffi- 
cult to get native clerks, as those trained in Lower Burma 
were, for several reasons, unsuitable for the rough-and-ready 
methods we now had to employ, but I was fortunate enough 
to secure one, a young fellow named Tun Lwin, who was of 
great assistance through his intelligence, industry, and hon- 
esty. Only this year I welcomed Tun Lwin to England, where 
he came with his family (including a grandchild) to have the 
boys educated in England, and to complete eating his dinners 
at the Bar ! He rose steadily in the service, becoming a magis- 
trate, and even acting as district judge and deputy commis- 
sioner and is now qualifying as a barrister with the intention 
of improving his prospects, and a good career is open to one 
of his character and ability. I expect he looks back with some 
amusement to our early proceedings, which were usually held 
under a tree on the river bank. There sat the deputy commis- 
sioner, while the police officer, Macdermott, haled the accused 
before him, a few witnesses on either side protested volubly, 
and then down came the verdict ! This kind of procedure is, 
in reality, more congenial to orientals. They prefer to have 
a whole day to argue and palaver, but what they particularly 
approve is that Huzoor or Ashin-paxa (your honour, my Lord) 
should hear them personally and himself pronounce decision 
on intelligible grounds. If he is skilful in turning his sen- 
tences, they will probably applaud, even if the case goes against 
them. As false witness is not the exception but the rule, and 
the case has to be decided as far as possible on the character 



88 DAN TO BEERSHEBA 

of the accused, justice is as likely to be secured by this primi- 
tive method as by any other, and it has the advantage of being 
cheap. 

Dacoit hunting was, however, our principal occupation. It 
must be remembered that the country, even before we took it 
over, had got into a state of anarchy. Bands of robbers lived 
by terrorising the districts, and many had been in league with 
the Woons (ministers) at Mandalay, to whom they paid 
tribute. When Theebaw fell, his army, numbering five or six 
thousand at Mandalay but some seventeen thousand in all, 
was disbanded and allowed to go off with all arms. This mis- 
take cost us a great deal. The disbanded men of course joined 
the dacoits, whose numbers swelled daily. Every princeling 
who had any pretensions to royal descent started a Court and 
went into the dacoit business. It is one of the difficulties of 
imposing a new civilisation on a people that hardship and 
injustice cannot be avoided. A vast proportion of the Bur- 
mese bureaucracy lived on patronage and paid no taxes, while 
the peasantry were heavily (but irregularly) taxed. The ori- 
ental does not object to irregular taxation, even if it is des- 
potic, because there is always a chance that he may evade it 
in some way, or may get into the privileged class. We had 
now to spread our fine net of administration and taxation all 
over the country so that the biggest, as well as the smallest, 
fish were alike enclosed. This involved what looked like 
hardship and injustice to people who saw no wrong in their 
privileges, and had been brought up to do nothing for a living. 
No wonder that all these causes combined to make our early 
years in Upper Burma a time full of storm and stress. 

The civil officers had, as one of their principal duties, to 
accompany the military expeditions in their attempts to clear 
out the dacoits, and now began a period of the most trying 
kind of warfare. Dozens of times we got information of a 
band within striking distance, perhaps quartered in a village, 
perhaps in a monastery close by. We waited till nightfall, then 
made a forced march — no easy thing in a roadless country 
largely covered with jungle. Timing ourselves to arrive at 
daybreak we dashed down on the village or kyoung, only to 
find the boh (dacoit chief) and his band had left "the evening 
before" ! Sometimes we felt certain that the innocent villagers 
who surrounded us with this news were actually members of 



IN UPPER BURMA 89 

the band, but in the absence of arms, for which we searched 
in vain, nothing could be proved. More than once we saw 
the band calmly streaming" out of one end of the village as 
we approached the other, and as our soldiers were on foot and 
were not so fleet as the dacoits, pursuit was useless. One day 
we ''surprised'' a village in this way, and I saw the tail of the 
band vanishing into the woods. I was mounted with two 
Burmese orderlies, and thinking to head them off I galloped 
round and found myself in the middle of them before I knew 
where I was. They had hidden their firearms and were only 
carrying dhas (long Burmese swords), and being really taken 
unawares they were more in a hurry than usual. I daresay 
they thought my men were on my heels, so only stopped to 
give a slash or two at us, wounding one of the orderlies, and 
then they vanished into the jungle! I well remember how 
heartily I endorsed the remarks of a Tommy overheard while 
resting in a sayat before starting for one of our morning "sur- 
prises." "Well, wot's to happen to-day?" asked one. "Same 
old game," growled another. "Forty miles across country in 

the blarsted heat and not a b y poongyee at the end of it!" 

It became obvious that hunting dacoits with infantry was 
worse than futile, and the health of the troops suffered severe- 
ly. Therefore some cavalry were sent up, but being found 
useless the infantry were mounted on Burmese tats and trained. 
I believe the first experiment of this sort was made by Major 
Penn Symons in my own district. It is interesting to remem- 
ber that he got his promotion only just in time to avoid being 
retired on account of age. Poor Penn Symons. a most gallant 
officer, a splendid horseman and keen soldier, was very anx- 
ious on this account when I first knew him. Pie served his 
country gallantly for another thirteen years, and no one was 
more deeply mourned when he fell at Talana, at the beginning 
of the Boer war. His mounted infantry was very successful, 
and we now got to closer quarters with the dacoits and had 
some hot times. The Government of India chose to regard 
the trouble as due only to lawless bands, but a feeble but genu- 
ine national movement was also involved, and the villagers 
and priests, who were represented as "terrorised," were ac- 
tually often in sympathy with the bohs. The aid given by 
women to the bands was one of our most serious difficulties, 
for we could not wage war on them, and yet they led us astray 



90 DAN TO BEERSHEBA 

with false information, concealed arms, supplied the dacoits 
with food, and acted as spies and scouts. This made the 
pacification something more than it was officially supposed 
to be. and the false economy which attempted to run the coun- 
try with a handful of raw officials, understaffed and not ade- 
quately supported, cost us dear in the long run. The occu- 
pation was effected by n,ooo troops, but by July, 1887, no 
less than 32,000 troops, apart from a large body of military 
police, were employed in "pacifying" the country. 

In the jumble of impressions remembered — of hot and weary 
marches, of broken sleep and of quick confused engagements, 
the ping of a bullet and a falling body, the rush and slash of 
dhas and the thrust of bayonets, the empty village with a few 
silent bodies, the groans of wounded and over all the fiery 
Eastern sky, the rank vegetation, the water we dare not take 
to cool our parched lips, the sudden downpours of rain that 
left us steaming wet — amidst all these memories specially re- 
called is the first time I was really under fire. I had seen 
fighting before, but as a non-combatant. Here we had a de- 
tachment of Hampshires commanded by Lieutenant Smith, 
and a small native contingent nominally led by a subadhar 
who, however, was not very keen on leading. At a turn of 
the jungle road we were suddenly greeted by a heavy volley 
which dropped several men. We found ourselves in an open 
valley, with a group of pagodas on the right on a raised mound 
and jungle on either side. The dacoits were safely ensconced 
in the pagodas, and our task was to rush the mound, as we 
could not cross the valley under their fire. Smith and his 
Hampshires deployed to the right and the native troops to the 
left, and as Smith could not be in two places at once I had 
to keep the subadhar up to the mark. My chief impression 
was that the subadhar was generally lying on his stomach 
behind any bit of cover while I, a much better mark for bullets, 
was standing up prominently behind him, and my one thought, 
as I kicked the line along, was that for the honour of my 
country / must not lie down, though it seemed to me not only 
the most desirable but the most sensible thing to do. After 
all, being shot was not my job ! Never for a moment did I 
think we should get through, and out of our little force we 
lost fifteen in a few moments. It was a great surprise to me 
when we found ourselves inside the pagoda wall with the 



IN UPPER BURMA 91 

dacoits in flight. They put up a very good fight in the teeth 
of our superior fire, and a considerable number lay dead. I 
may mention here that, just after writing this paragraph, I 
was reading the recollections of David Christie Murray and 
find that his feelings under fire were as unheroic as my own. 
He tells a good story of men boasting at the Savage Club of 
the exhilaration of being in battle, and how he stole away, 
discouraged at his own very different experience, and met 
Archibald Forbes, to whom he confided his trouble. Forbes 
said, "Go back to your club and tell 'em on my authority that 
they're all liars." From what I knew of Forbes I expect he 

said, "D d liars !" Forbes had been through seventeen 

campaigns. 

Smith and I had a number of small scrimmages together, 
and one which approached a real "engagement," or "show" 
as it is now the fashion to call it. We went out with about 
twenty-five mounted Hampshires, and some native troops. We 
wanted to get the Hampshires, who were the backbone of the 
force, fresh on to the ground. We made the usual forced 
night march, and at daybreak surprised not the enemy but 
ourselves by finding that a big band of dacoits was established 
in a village which offered peculiar advantages as a defensive 
post. It not only had a prickly fence all round, but the ap- 
proach to it was commanded on either side by two groups of 
pagodas backed by jungle. With the native troops I captured 
one pagoda, and the Hampshires were out in the open attack- 
ing the village and losing men. I wanted to get my lot out 
to assist them, moving out gradually until we were in a posi- 
tion to rush the village simultaneously with the Hampshires. 
My native contingent, formed of somewhat heterogeneous up- 
country Indians, had behaved fairly well up to this point, but 
both on this occasion and others they were handicapped by not 
having their own officers. I had got them behind the pagoda 
but couldn't get them out again! Finally, in desperation, I 
seized a fat and lusty Sepoy by the hair — his head was shaved 
except for a tuft — and held him out in front of me, outside 
the friendly shelter of the pagoda, where shots came whistling 
pretty thickly, and I swore by all the gods that I would serve 
every one of them thus in turn if they would not come out 
into the open of their own accord. Thus adjured, and with 
their comrade squirming and bellowing, they hastily prom- 



92 DAN TO BEERSHEBA 

ised to obey me and our programme was successfully carried 
out. We only captured the village after several hours, and 
when we got into it we were too exhausted to do anything but 
drop where we stood, having marched all night and fought 
for the best part of the day in that frightful, hot, damp 
climate. 

By no means satisfied as to the method, or lack of method, 
we were now employing, I embodied my ideas of a more ef- 
fective policy, not founded entirely on punitive military meas- 
ures, in a despatch to the local government. In this I drew 
a parallel between Burma and La Vendee and recalled the 
policy of General Hoche. The Times of November 23, 1886, 
says: -"Mr. Colquhoun has discovered in Thiers' account of 
the pacification of La Vendee an example of systematic and 
intelligent procedure which he thinks not unworthy of the 
attention of men engaged in a similar task in Burma. Sir 
Frederick Roberts has published the document in the Man- 
dalay supplement of the official Gazette." The same parallel 
had occurred to Roberts himself in India, though I did not 
know this at the time, and I believe he wrote a despatch on 
the subject. The general plan advised, which was actually 
adopted in principle by General White, was to cover the coun- 
try with military posts and flying columns, disarming the pop- 
ulation as far as possible, and (the most important points in 
my judgment) pushing on roads and other communications 
and making a direct appeal to the poongyes (the prototypes 
of the Vendean cures) through whose influence alone we could 
hope to conciliate the people. Roberts paid a visit to the 
Thathanabaing (archbishop) with a large body of officers, 
including, if I remember aright, six generals. "I have four 
words to say, and I wish you to take them as principles of 
your government,'' said the head of the Buddhist church. "They 
are myitia (love), gar una (mercy), mudita (beneficence), 
upayka (discrimination and moderation)." Throughout the 
recent South African war I traced with deep interest an ex- 
traordinary resemblance to this period in Burma, and especially 
in the part played by the women and predikants. In Sagain 
we had made some forty miles of road and many more of 
tracks through the jungle, which made the operations of the 
mounted infantry possible. 

After about eighteen months I went down with fever and 



IN UPPER BURMA 93 

was taken to Rangoon by the river steamer, being carried on 
board in a state of delirium. After two or three days at sea 
I felt a different being, and although I have suffered from 
fever both before and since I have always found the sea a sure 
specific. 

After a short holiday at home I returned to my district, and 
the pacification went on slowly but surely. I was presently 
gent up to the Ruby Mines district, a broken highland region 
at an average height of 4,000 feet, whose centre is some sixty 
miles inland from the Irrawaddy River. Geographically it 
is part of the Shan plateau and is a mass of hills running north 
and south. The mining population of Mogok, the chief town, 
had always been noted for its turbulence, and the district itself, 
accessible only by mountain tracks, was a difficult and dan- 
gerous one. The mines had been taken over just after the 
annexation by a syndicate, with Mr. Streeter (the well-known 
Bond Street jeweller) at the head. Shortly afterwards the 
Ruby Mines Company was formed, of which my late friend, 
Sir Lepel Griffin, was chairman, but a combination of heavy 
working expenses and the peculation which is so difficult to 
control militated against its success. Under Burmese rule 
illicit ruby dealing, or e\-en illegal possession of a ruby, could 
be punished with death, but under our rule an imprisonment 
of a few days was the only deterrent, while that depended on 
proof that the ruby was irregularly obtained, and such proof 
was difficult to secure. At one time the company desired to 
form a "compound" for their workers on the Kimberley pat- 
tern, but the Government of India very properly resisted this. 
A well-known character in my day — he may still be living — 
was the trader Mating Hmat, called the "King of Mogok," 
an immensely wealthy man whose dealings in rubies, both 
legitimate and otherwise, were very extensive. Maung Hmat 
was one of our friends who was always supremely innocent 
about dacoits. No information ever came his way, and he 
was always surprised at their depredations. I have no doubt 
they subsidised him, and probably he also subsidised them — 
such an arrangement would have been by no means unusual. 
Perhaps as an expiation for his misdeeds, Maung Hmat, who 
was a pious Buddhist, performed many "works of merit," 
building bridges, rest-houses and monasteries with his ill- 



94 DAN TO BEERSHEBA 

gotten wealth — "fire insurance," as the witty American 
called it. 

At Mogok I lived in a pleasant bungalow on the top of a 
hill by myself, and our society consisted of a military-police 
officer, Lieutenant Anderson, a civil police officer, Richardson 
(still alive in Burma, I think), Mr. Atlay, the company's 
agent, and occasionally a forest officer. We had some Indian 
military police but no regular troops, until the end of 1888. 
The Ruby Mines valley was kept fairly quiet, but the neigh- 
bouring Shan State of Momeit, over which I had political con- 
trol, was in a disturbed condition, and it became necessary to 
send an expedition there to defend that town and prevent 
incursions into our own district. Momeit (the capital of the 
State of that name and residence of the Tsawbwa or chief) 
was a small stockaded town, and I feared it might fall into 
the hands of Saw Yannaing, a notorious boh, and enable him 
to seize food supplies and arms and control an avenue of 
communication of some importance. I went there myself with 
a few Burmese and nine military police (four of whom fell 
ill) and was there from December 29 till January 3. I then 
asked for some troops to garrison Momeit, and receiving these 
from Mandalay took up Lieutenant Nugent and thirty of the 
Hampshire regiment and left them with express directions, 
both verbally and in writing, to garrison the town. I also sent 
Anderson to act as intelligence officer and to give Nugent the 
benefit of his great local knowledge and experience. Pres- 
ently, however, when Anderson was out reconnoitring, Nugent 
got news of a dacoit band raiding villages in the neighbour- 
hood, and being full of pluck he decided to sally out and take 
the offensive. He found the dacoits strongly stockaded. I 
afterwards visited the spot and, with my own limited military 
knowledge, should have deemed it madness to attack with 
such a force. In the first assault he lost a man, had six 
wounded, and was wounded himself. Instead of withdrawing 
he made another attempt and received a fatal wound. His 
sergeant, Beer, took over command and, as a proof of the 
temerity to which Nugent sacrificed his life, his subordinate 
was able to withdraw without further casualties and to carry 
back to Momeit both the dead and the wounded men as well as 
the body of his lieutenant. This happened on January 14, 1889. 

On getting this news, I at once went up with some more 



IN UPPER BURMA. 95 

troops to Momeit, where Sergeant Beer was holding the town, 
and with Anderson went out to engage the band and wipe out 
the impression of the check we had received. This was done 
promptly and effectually on January 19. I had already wired 
the news to the Chief Commissioner, and asked for more 
troops. His answer, dated January 19, was to the effect that 
I had no business to be undertaking operations outside Momeit, 
since the defence of that town was my only duty. He said 
he was sending the troops I had asked for, but it was "very 
inconvenient," as he had a great deal on hand, and he hoped 
there would be no more "ill-considered enterprises." 

Of course I had a complete answer to this censure in the 
orders originally received from him, and in those I had given 
to Lieutenant Nugent, which were extant in writing, as well 
as being known to other officers. I was, however, considerably 
nettled by the tone of the C. C.'s despatch, especially as I had 
been given no information as to the movements of certain 
Gurkha troops in my district, and was quite unaware that 
events made any movement on my part "inconvenient." More- 
over in the C. C.'s letter I was told (for the first time) that 
I might have safely left Saw Yannaing alone to be dealt with 

later on by Lieutenant , a young political officer, who 

had just been sent up to the Shan States. Now, I had had no in- 
formation about and his movements, except from non- 
official sources, and I was annoyed that such a post should 
have been entrusted to a man with so little experience, who 
moreover did not communicate with my own Commissioner 
(of the northern districts) but worked direct with the C. C, 
so that we were kept completely in the dark as to his intentions. 

Before I was able to reply to the C. C. I had received from 
Mandalay a copy of an article in the Mandalay Herald of Jan- 
uary 22, containing an account of Nugent's death and an at- 
tack on my conduct in the affair. I was represented as leav- 
ing the poor boy to meet his death while removing myself to 
a place of safety. The libel was widely circulated and credited 
without any contradiction on the part of the local government, 
and the Herald itself, rightly or wrongly, was usually believed 
to be "inspired." One of the charges against me was that I 
left Nugent without the assistance of a civil officer with knowl- 
edge of the country and language, but as a matter of fact I 
had sent up to him, immediately I returned to Mogok, Lieu- 



96 DAN TO BEERSHEBA 

tenant Anderson (battalion commandant of the military po- 
lice), who was exceptionally qualified in both ways, and who 
was only temporarily absent on reconnaissance when Nugent 
made his ill-advised sortie. The fact that I had nothing to 
blame myself with did not, as it should have done, mitigate the 
rage with which I read the article and the C. C.'s letter to 
me of January 19 (written on receipt of telegraphic news 
only), in which he plainly took the view that the disaster was 
due to my having acted not only without orders but blunder- 
ingly. 

Under the sense of injustice, and in the irritation natural 
to a man of my temperament (I was not called "Blazes" for 
nothing) I wired at once to Mr. Moylan, a barrister at Ran- 
goon, requesting him to take proceedings to clear me of the 
imputations of the Mandalay Herald. My telegrams gave in- 
formation of the movements of the dacoits which had, as I 
believed, been kept in check by my action in garrisoning Mo- 
meit. That this was perfectly unnecessary I see now, since 
I had distinct orders to occupy Momeit and had no need to 
justify myself on that score, but I was biassed in my action 
by a desire, natural but not prudent, not only to prove that 
I was in the right but to show that my superiors had under- 
estimated the position. My telegrams were followed up by 
a letter to Mr. Moylan — the most important letter I ever wrote. 
It is dated Mogok, January 30th, 1889. The crux of the situ- 
ation lay in the fact that Mr. Moylan, my private friend and 
legal adviser in this case, was also the correspondent to the 
Times. It will be remembered that he had been pretty free 
with his strictures on the Government, and efforts to secure 
his recall had been unsuccessfully made. It was a part of my 
general indiscretion that I chose this particular man as my 
adviser and confidant at this moment. 

Now this letter, with very outspoken criticism of the policy 
pursued by my superior officers, and containing more inflam- 
matory material than even appeared on the surface, was not 
destined to reach the person to whom it was addressed. On 
the same day I wrote a "semi-official" to the C. C. at Man- 
dalay, and I am convinced that both letters were enclosed 
and superscribed aright. But when the C. C. opened the 
one to him out fell the other without an envelope. He picked 
it up and began to read it, and having begun went on to the 



IN UPPER BURMA 97 

end. It is just conceivable that until he got to the second sen- 
tence he might have imagined the letter to be enclosed for his 
perusal, though only if he had neglected to read the semi- 
official with which it came. After the first two sentences, how- 
ever, no doubt could have remained as to the private character 
of the letter, and when the second paragraph was reached it 
became apparent that this was that most privileged and pri- 
vate of communications — a man's instructions to his lawyer. 
The C. C. read to the end. 

He does not appear to have suffered from any great inde- 
cision as to the line to take, for, on February 4th, through 
his secretary, he wrote to me recounting the circumstance by 
which my letter to Moylan had come into his hands, and adding 
that "he has no desire to take advantage of an accident, though 
he considers the disloyalty and treachery evidenced in your 
letter deserves little consideration.'' Having thus delivered 
himself of a generous sentiment, he went on : "It is, however, 
a matter of public importance that officers should act honestly 
and loyally towards their Government and that Government 
should know the character of the men serving under it, and 
therefore your letter . . . has been submitted to His Excel- 
lency the Viceroy." The "disloyalty and treachery" with 
which I was charged could not, of course, have been committed 
in a private communication, so the point was to demonstrate 
that I had broken not only the ordinary regulations but my ex- 
press promise by making communications for publication to 
the press. 

The reader will observe that I was not given any opportunity 
for explanation or protest before my case was sent up to the 
highest tribunal, and this although the mere fact of such an 
action being taken by my superior officer would certainly 
damp my prospects, and might even "break" me altogether. 
My only protest at first — for I had not even a copy of the in- 
criminating letter and, as it had been dashed off in a hurry, 
remembered little about it — was that a private letter should 
be regarded as privileged. As a matter of fact, while the 
privacy of the letter might have influenced the C. C. not to 
read it, there were portions of it — especially the remarks about 

in the Northern States and the request that information 

should not be traced to me — which could neither be excused 



98 DAN TO BEERSHEBA 

nor explained away. I see this more clearly now than I did 
at the time. 

The qualifying and mitigating circumstances, however, 
which the C.C. did not take into account, and which were 
never officially presented to the Indian Government and could 
not, therefore, be expected to influence their judgment, were 
of a twofold character. First, I was acting in a moment of 
passion and under a strong sense of grievance about the Mo- 
meit affair. This might have been allowed as some slight pal- 
liation for the bitterness of my comments. The two things 
were closely connected, though the connection was not plain 
to the Indian Government. Then my offence against the regu- 
lations in supplying the Press with information had been con- 
doned in principle by the C. C., and it was notorious that both 
military and civil officials in Burma were in the habit of com- 
municating items of news. Moreover, I had some right to 
consider myself specially absolved from this rule, and from 
the promise I had made to Sir Charles Bernard, since I had 
received from the C. C. himself (Sir Charles Bernard's suc- 
cessor) a request, first through my Commissioner and then 
in writing, that I would contribute some views on Burma to 
the Times. 

In my defence I was able, how r ever, to plead that I had only 
once, and that at the C. C.'s request (prior to the letter of 
January 30) communicated anything to the Press. This was 
not the view put forward by the C. C. He chose to declare 
that I was in the habit of supplying Moylan with information 
for use in the Times, and found in the most innocent of my 
sentences food for suspicion. Thus, in the incriminating letter 
I acknowledged the receipt of letters from "Mr. Walter" and 
"Macgregor," and spoke of writing to Macdonald "re ap- 
pointment of Symes, also re Thirkell White's late acting ap- 
pointment." My correspondents were of course the proprietor, 
Calcutta correspondent, and manager of the Times, but my 
letters to them — all personal friends — had been of the most 
unobjectionable character, though the last one certainly con- 
tained some news and comments, not necessarily for publica- 
tion. It was of course intolerable that private correspondence 
should have been suspect in this way, and ridiculous too. Mr. 
Walter, for instance, was as likely to correspond with me on 
Indian affairs as the Queen! My opinion of a subordinate 



IN UPPER BURMA 99 

fellow-official, though expressed in terms unflattering to those 
who appointed him, could not really be construed into high 
treason, but a great deal was made, and still more implied, as 
to these communications with newspaper friends, and also as 
to the telegrams I mentioned that I had sent to Moylan about 
movements around Momeit. 

As a matter of fact, however, it was of little consequence 
what was the degree of my crime, for if the C. C. chose to 
regard it as sufficiently serious to send up to Calcutta, and 
if he was not prepared to advance or allow mitigating circum- 
stances, the Government of India, seeing that I had contra- 
vened rules and regulations, were bound to punish me. Under 
the shadow of this affair I was suspended and went home, 
while my case was under consideration. 

The affair of the letter dragged on till the following March. 
My actual offence was aggravated, I was told, by my persisting 
in stating that the offending letter was a private one in a 
separate envelope. On cooler reflection, I really do not think 
that it can have reached the C. C. separately enclosed. The 
postmaster on the riverside station of my district was an Eura- 
sian on whom I had had to report confidentially a short time 
before, and this report was by no means favorable, as he was 
an ex-convict under an assumed name. I now think it prob- 
able that this man was in the habit of sampling the correspond- 
ence, and he may have seen my report and had a grudge 
against me which induced him to open the two letters of Jan- 
uary 30 and tamper with their contents. What trifles at times 
turn the scales of fate ! A little sealing-wax might have 
altered the whole course of my career. I might have stayed 
in Burma and have risen in time to a seat on the India Coun- 
cil, with a portly figure and a liver ! I might have been planted 
out in the land which received the bones of so many of my 
friends. But we had few luxuries at Mogok and were "out 
of" sealing-wax. Kismet! 

The moral is that one cannot be too careful about letters! 
One journalist of whom I have heard doubled the parts of 
correspondent to a sporting "rag" and writer on an evangelis- 
tic religious weekly. He put his contributions into the wrong 
envelopes, and the result to him was more fatal than to me — 
he was sacked by both ! 

I was not sacked. "The Governor-General in Council, rec- 



ioo DAN TO BEERSHEBA 

ognising that Mr. Colquhoun . . . has on many occasions 
exhibited energy and courage, is unwilling to take this ex- 
treme step; and therefore directs that Mr. Colquhoun shall 
be removed from his appointment as Deputy Commissioner 
in the Burma Commission and be remanded to the Public 
Works Department to the position which he held before 1886." 
The sequel to this was that I was gazetted to a post in Belu- 
chistan, but for reasons hereafter given did not take it up; 
indeed, I never afterwards did any active work under the 
Government of India, though remaining nominally in their 
service till 1894. I do not think the Indian Government could 
have acted otherwise under the circumstances and with the 
complexion put on the affair by the C. C. At the time I was 
very hot about it and agitated not unsuccessful^ at home, 
where I had the support of many influential people, as well as 
in India; but I see now that I was treated with generosity 
after being guilty of insubordination which even the aggrava- 
tion could not excuse though it might explain. 

Home I went, taking a few months' holiday in Scotland, 
which I much needed, and when it seemed certain that my 
prospects under the Indian Government were blighted I began 
to look about for another sphere of action. Among my friends 
and acquaintances was Rochfort Maguire, who introduced me 
to Alfred Beit, and the latter, after I had seen him several 
times, gave me letters to Cecil Rhodes in Kimberley. He was 
so keen that I should go that he actually secured for me a 
passage out in the kindest way. My Times money had been 
flung right and left on my propaganda for railways and other 
projects, and not, I may say, on personal indulgence. Some 
money, moreover, I had been deprived of by a "friend" who 
acted as my agent while I was abroad and had a power of 
attorney. He had lightened my banking account to the tune 
of five or six hundred pounds, and received me in the most 
debonair and friendly manner. It was no use suing him, and 
as a matter of fact I was sorry for him and for his family. 
It was, therefore, not surprising that, on suddenly having my 
pay cut down from that of a deputy commissioner to that of 
an executive engineer, I was at what is vulgarly called a loose 
end. My old father, with a young family to bring up, could 
not have helped me had I thought of asking, and Mr. Beit's 
assistance was most opportune. The chance might have been 



IN UPPER BURMA 101 

missed for want of his help. I am glad to say I was shortly 
in a position to repay him, and am happy to have the oppor- 
tunity of acknowledging my obligation to a man who was not 
only a financial genius but a kind-hearted gentleman. I had 
other dealings with him in after days and was always treated 
in the same spirit of consideration, while for tact I have seldom 
seen his equal. Mr. Buckle, editor of the Times, gave me a 
letter to Rhodes recommending me on account of my frontier 
work, and Rochfort Maguire, who knew all about me, also 
wrote to Kimberley. 

In this new phase of my life I thought that I had forever 
said good-bye to Asia, but I was wrong. I have returned to 
it again and again since then, and still "hear the East 
a-calling!" 



CHAPTER XI 

SOUTH AFRICA AND RHODES 

When one has many departures and arrivals in one's life 
it is hard to keep them distinct in one's memory, but I shall 
never forget my start for South Africa. If I have a night- 
mare now, and if it does not take the form of a competitive 
examinations which I have got to pass, I dream I am catching 
trains — the nightmare trains which always come in at the 
wrong platforms and generally behave in a distractingly er- 
ratic way. I suppose I shall be considered very "casual," but 
it is a fact that with all there was at stake I nearly missed the 
South African mail-boat train ! I had not had much time for 
preparation, it is true, but then I never made preparations in 
the usual sense. After a day or two full of business I found 
myself on my last evening dining with a party of chums, in- 
cluding Stewart Lockhart home from China, Duncan Louttit, 
and others. After a most cheery night I went back to my 
rooms in the early morning, and was faced by a great mass 
of letters to be answered and attended to, which still littered 
my desk. My portmanteau lay open on the floor and my per- 
sonal effects were scattered about. I wrote and my friends 
packed. Every now and then they shouted to me: "Has this 
beastly despatch-box got to go in ?" or "Do you want all these 
beastly maps?" But they did not bother to consult me over 
clothes, and I was too busy to care. The cab was at the door 
before the last bag was strapped or the last letter written, and 
we caught the train by the skin of our teeth. 

I sailed on the ss. Mexican on November 29, 1889, among 
my shipmates being Colonel Frank Rhodes, with whom I went 
up to Kimberley; Mr. C. D. Rudd, who was one of the men 
concerned in obtaining the concession from King Lobengula;* 
and an American, Hennen Jennings, who was going out to 
Johannesburg as consulting engineer to Messrs. Eckstein and 

102 



SOUTH AFRICA AND RHODES 103 

Wernher Beit. Jennings and I had tastes in common, had 
both been partly educated in Germany, and struck up a friend- 
ship. 

Arrived at Cape Town I lost no time in seeing "sights," but 
made straight for Kimberley, being well aware that I was not 
the only runner in the field. The actual scheme which Mr. 
Rhodes was then working out was not known to the general 
public, or indeed to anyone outside his immediate circle, but 
the fact of a large concession and the formation of the com- 
pany for its development had raised high expectations. I 
therefore raced up to Kimberley and saw the great man. I 
did not have to wait long for his verdict, and on Saturday, 
December 28th, I was able to wire to my friends that Mr. 
Rhodes had offered me an administrative post with the British 
South Africa Company, it being understood that I was to 
stay six months or so with him and then go up to the new 
territory and start the colony. The form in which my ap- 
pointment was confirmed by Rhodes in writing (at my re- 
quest) is so characteristic that I give it here. It must be 
remembered that he detested putting pen to paper. 

"December 28, /09. 
"Dear Mr. Colquhoun, 

"I am prepared to offer you an appointment with salary of 
i8oo per annum pending our obtaining civil administration in 
the Chartered Co. territory, after which I will find you an 
independent post in the civil administration at a salary of not 
less than £1,500 per annum. Of course the latter depends on 
our obtaining the administration of the territory. 

"Yours truly, 

"C. J. Rhodes, 
"For the British South Africa Co. 
"P.S. — My idea would be to give you charge of Mashona- 
land as soon as practicable." 

Kimberley, where I first saw the empire-builder, was not 
the modern town of villa residences and big shops. There 
were a few decent houses, but Rhodes lived in a tin-roofed 
shanty belonging to Jameson, just opposite the club, and I occu- 
pied a similar one, with Robinow, Michaelis junior and Otto 
Beit. The offices of the Chartered Company were simply a 



104 DAN TO BEERSHEBA 

couple of rooms in the De Beers building, and we messed at 
the Kimberley Club. Rhodes had his own little table, to which 
only his intimates were invited. However much he might be 
prepared to rough it in his surroundings he always liked a 
good table, and the club was already famous throughout South 
Africa not only for its cuisine (all materials having to be 
brought from the Cape) but for its wines, which were varied 
and choice. The place was, in a colloquial phrase, "stuffed with 
money" — more millionaires to the square foot than any other 
place in the world ("Joburg" had not yet arrived) — and from 
Rhodes downwards everyone was careless about dress, about 
housing, about everything except food and drink — especially 
drink. Kimberley is not now what it was. A year or so ago 
I tasted in an engineer's hut on the Zambesi River some singu- 
larly good hock — "From the Kimberley Club," said my host. 
"They had a sale of wines there the other day !" What Kim- 
berley is like with De Beers closed down I hardly like to think 
— Hamlet without not only the ghost but lacking Polonius, the 
Players, and half the rest of the cast ! 

A well-known drinking-bar was the place where big trans- 
actions of all kinds were put through, and it was a current 
story of Beit that in former days, when other men, with imagi- 
nations inflamed by copious libations of champagne, were try- 
ing to do arithmetic on their shirt cuffs, he was coolly present- 
ing his mental calculations and demonstrations and "pulling 
off" big strokes of business in consequence. The atmosphere 
of Kimberley in my time was electric. Big things were in 
the air. "Northern expansion" was on everyone's lips, the 
Rand was expected to "move" immediately, and actually did 
so in the same year. Anyone might be a millionaire next day. 
I recollect one young fellow, a German clerk in Eckstein's, 
who, after several adventures, made £80,000, but at what a 
price ! He told me himself it had cost him his life. His nerves 
were broken with the strain. He went home, and after hang- 
ing about "cures" for a few years died — a victim to gold fever. 
At this time, however, all were full of hopes and specula- 
tions, and gambling was rife. Outside this we talked a great 
deal of I.D.B. (illicit diamond buying), and everyone else was 
full of tales as to this not uncommon foundation for great 
fortunes. Many of the millionaires who have since peopled 
Park Lane were familiar figures, though by no means all had 



SOUTH AFRICA AND RHODES 105 

the entree to the Kimberley Club, and practically none were 
met in the houses of the Government officials or married 
people. 

Our amusements were limited. We rode or drove out in 
the morning or evening to get a breath of air, which hangs 
heavily over the flat plain on which Kimberley stands. Trav- 
elling comedy or opera bouffe companies came up from Cape 
Town with strong contingents of soubrettes, and as feminine 
society was limited these young ladies had a good time with 
the jennesse doree, some of whom found themselves saddled 
for life with companions who were hardly fitted to share their 
later fortunes. Male dinner parties were sometimes given, 
and were not always successful. I went to one at the private 
house of a "prominent citizen," which ended in an altercation 
between the host and one of his guests and a fight, in which 
the latter was sent flying amidst the debris of the feast. We 
all left in disgust, and I walked home with Rhodes, who said 
nothing for a time and then broke out with, "What cads ! but 
one has to put up with them!" Rhodes throughout his life 
took a long ride every morning as far as possible, and his 
usual companions were "Tim" Tyson, who ran the Kimberley 
Club till his death a year or so ago, or Gardner Williams. 
Often they rode an hour or more without a word. 

It is known that Rhodes was careless about dress. I think 
at this time he was the worst-dressed man I have ever seen! 
His old felt hat was battered and dirty, his trousers bagged 
at the knees, and his coats at the pockets. Later on, when 
he was in London, friends got hold of hirn and took him to 
a good tailor, so that his things were well cut at all events, 
but I should think he was quite capable of buying them ready 
made! When entertaining guests at Groot Schuur he never 
went up to dress till the first carriage was heard driving up, 
and five or six minutes sufficed for his toilet. I got this little 
characteristic detail from Sir Charles Metcalfe, having re- 
marked one day that he dressed quicker than any man I knew. 
He said Rhodes could do even better, and they often used to 
race ! He told me also that a favourite amusement of Rhodes, 
when in a railway train or hotel, was to invent histories for 
people he saw or to speculate as to their relationship to each 
other — by no means a bad pastime for anyone with a turn for 
reading character and noting little details of deportment. 



106 DAN TO BEERSHEBA 

I was greatly interested in the engineering works at Kim- 
berley, which were largely the creation of the American, Gard- 
ner Williams, a well-known engineer in his own country and 
a cultivated and interesting man who with his wife lived in 
his own bungalow, rather apart from the social life which 
centred in the Club. His son is now the chief engineer of De 
Beers. Sir Charles Metcalfe came down for a few days 
every now and then from the survey work for railways on 
which he was engaged. He had originally come out to South 
Africa representing influential private persons who desired to 
detach Rhodes from the "eliminate the Imperial factor" policy 
of which he was then the apostle. He was able to assure his 
friends that Rhodes was really sound on the Imperial con- 
nection, and as a matter of fact, when the time comes for a 
full history of these times, it will be found that Cecil Rhodes 
had two distinct periods of political aims, and that the second, 
with its wide Imperialist vision of a great territory to the 
north which would be British at the core and balance the rest 
of South Africa — this vision dates from about 1888. Once 
he had decided, powerful influence at home helped to secure 
the Charter and the support necessary for carrying out the 
daring plans he conceived. I know that once or twice during 
my period of office work at Kimberley he was afraid that his 
backers were going to fail him, and his language on these 
occasions was lurid, for though not habitually intemperate in 
speech he was subject to fits of rage in which he let himself 
go. Sir Charles Metcalfe, who was one of Rhodes' closest 
intimates in later years and up to his death, is still at work 
on the "Cape to Cairo" railway, which is usually spoken of 
as one of Rhodes' great ideas. It was, however, in its original 
form an engineering conception, and the name "Cape to Cairo" 
occurs in an article written by Metcalfe and Ricarde Seaver 
in the Fortnightly Review of 1888, before Rhodes had given 
it serious consideration. Mr. Stead adopted the idea and the 
name, and was even credited by some with having invented 
the latter, and Rhodes, once his interest had been roused, was 
ardent in his support of a project which helped to enlist the 
popular imagination in favour of his "Northern expansion." 
The story of the concession, obtained by him personally from 
the Emperor, that the line should be permitted to pass through 
German territory is well known. It is to be regretted that 



SOUTH AFRICA AND RHODES 107 

Rhodes never saw the glorious Falls, now accessible to all 
by the line his support made possible. He had a favourite 
imagination about the spray dashing against the windows of 
the carriage as the train, on a slender framework of steel, 
crawled over the bottomless abyss in which the waters boil 
for ever, and where the great sheet comes crashing down from 
the height above. It is all there — the bridge, the train, the 
spray, and the boiling abyss — the grandest sight on God's 
earth. But Cecil Rhodes never saw it. 

I was still a servant of the Government of India. On re- 
ceiving Rhodes' offer of December 28, I wrote asking for 
permission to retire on a pension commensurate with the term 
of my service. Rhodes himself also wrote asking the Colonial 
Office to secure him my services. My first request was refused, 
but it was eventually arranged that I should be ''seconded" 
for three years, which were to count towards my service. Dur- 
ing these years I had to pay a considerable sum to keep up 
my claim to a pension, which in the ordinary course of events 
would not be my right until I had served another fifteen years 
or so. I belonged to the uncovenanted service whose pension 
conditions are inferior to those of the covenanted service. 
I may as well finish this subject by explaining that at the end 
of these three years I asked for and received permission to 
resign, receiving a special pension, so that my object of secur- 
ing an independent and certain income was finally attained. 

At the period of my arrival in South Africa the question 
of communications was most important and pressing. From 
Cape Town the line, which had recently reached Kimberley, 
was being pushed on to Vryburg (in British Bechuanaland) 
skirting the Orange Free State and the Transvaal Republic. 
The importance of the extension through Bechuanaland of 
this road to the north lay in the fact that an irruption of the 
Boers on the north might at any moment have cut the route 
to that land of promise which contained the concession from 
Lobengula, the King of Matabeleland, which was to be the 
foundation of a British colony. The Cape railways were being 
extended to Bloemfontein, and in the Transvaal Kruger was 
pushing forward the Delagoa Bay line with all the speed pos- 
sible, for a variety of reasons which need not be discussed here. 

I went at Mr. Rhodes' desire to Johannesburg and Pretoria, 
and at the latter place had an interview with the President in 



108 DAN TO BEERSHEBA 

which railways absorbed most of our attention, my real ob- 
jective in South Africa being somewhat hidden by my well- 
known interest in communications. I was to sound Kruger 
and if possible find out, without direct questions, what was 
his attitude to our "Northern expansion." 

I found the President on the stoep of the unpretentious 
shabby little house which is still shown to visitors in Pretoria 
as the "Kruger home." This house was converted, after the 
peace of 1903, into a hotel — "The President's Hotel" — and 
this outrage on sentiment was not the result of a stranger's 
indifference but of the business-like, unimaginative character 
of his own friends and relations to whom it belonged. The 
house stands on the road and just opposite to the ugly, red- 
brick Gereformeerde Church, whose silver-gilt bell accompa- 
nied the President in his flight. In the room which was his 
bedroom, beneath the heavy wooden bedstead, was a secret 
passage and chamber, the former intended, I believe, to lead 
over to the church, but I do not think it was ever completed. 
Probably the President used it as a strong-room. When opened 
it contained a musket or two, but nothing of special interest. 
In 1890 I found Paul Kruger, then sixty-five years of age, 
a strong-looking man. He sat in a leather-covered arm-chair, 
in dirty-looking clothes, his hair and beard long, a big Dutch 
pipe in his mouth, and a huge, red bandanna handkerchief 
hanging out of the side pocket of his loose jacket. A promi- 
nent piece of furniture was a large spittoon, of which he made 
frequent use. I was accompanied in my visit by Lord Hough- 
ton (the present Lord Crewe) and the Duke of Montrose, and 
the contrast between the men, especially between Houghton 
and the President, was very striking — the extremes of culture 
and boorishness. There is no doubt that, with all his surface 
rusticity, Kruger was a genius — a master of statecraft. His 
most striking characteristic was a sphinx-like immobility of 
countenance — no one could forget that great pale heavy face 
and the little eyes, whose lids closed over them like the hood 
of a cobra. He did not speak English and professed not to 
understand it, though as to this last I had my doubts. The 
advantage he gained, especially in later years, of time to turn 
things over in his mind while the interpreter was translating 
was one he was not likely to forego. He had learnt his craft 
from men and animals, not from books. All his similes — and 



SOUTH AFRICA AND RHODES 109 

he was fond of them — were taken from nature: for instance, 
the famous "tortoise" to which he likened the Uitlander. "Let 
it peer and peer, but wait till the head comes right out — then 
strike !" The head came out with a vengeance — and Kruger 
struck! The "Flag incident" the year before had not made 
him more friendly to the Uitlanders. The President was visit- 
ing Johannesburg and at a meeting the crowd sang "Rule, 
Britannia!" when the old man roared out "Blig still" (be 
quiet) — the crowd laughed and he stalked away. The same 
night the Transvaal flag over the Landrost's house was pulled 
down. I believe Kruger never again visited Johannesburg. 

My first sight of Johannesburg — Joburg as it is always 
called in South Africa — was not very impressive. There was 
a big square, where all the people came in and held a market, 
and where one engaged waggons for treks, arranged for sup- 
plies to be sent out to the mines, or put through any one of 
the multifarious pieces of business common in a town which 
is the centre of a pioneer population. Round this square were 
a few buildings, shops, one hotel, tin shanties and offices, and 
outside that a few rows of shanties and a number of corrugated 
iron houses dotted irregularly about. The rents of these most 
uncomfortable dwellings were perfectly colossal, and the cost 
of living was proportionate throughout. Service was almost 
unprocurable. Raw Kaffirs, who till a few months before had 
never seen the inside of a house, were pressed into a service 
for which they have no natural bent, and the best one could 
hope for was an inferior type of Cape boy. Only budding 
magnates like my host "Jim" Taylor could afford to keep up 
a decent establishment, and his house, well appointed and with 
an excellent table, was a perfect oasis in the dessert! He 
had a billiard room, I remember, and the house had some pre- 
tensions to architecture. In this billiard room I first saw 
Lionel Phillips, Abe Bailey, and many other magnates of later 
days. I recollect that in honour of the arrival of the Duke 
and Lord Houghton we decided to dress for dinner — a sacri- 
fice to the conventions not usual in Joburg in those days ! On 
another occasion we had quite a grand dinner party graced 
by the presence of two ladies, Mrs. Lionel Phillips being, I be- 
lieve, one of them. How quaint these recollections seem when I 
remember the Joburg of 1904 — as I last saw it ! Then I stayed 
with Lord Milner in what might have been a well appointed 



no DAN TO BEERSHEBA 

English country house with a pleasant garden round it. I 
dined at many houses where the appointments would have 
done credit to New York and the service to London, and went 
to the opera afterwards where an excellent performance of 
"Pagliacci" was witnessed by a fashionable and bejewelled 
audience. 

Joburg when I first saw it was devoid of trees, and was the 
ugliest place I had ever seen except Kimberley, being only 
slightly redeemed by the fact that it does not lie on a flat plain 
like the latter, but has some hills and valleys surrounding it. 
When I returned to it thirteen years afterwards, it was abso- 
lutely unrecognisable. Not only are there fine business quar- 
ters and shops but the residential portion stretches out in long 
roads lined with trees, and the fashionable quarter, Park Town, 
is like a pretty London suburb, with its pretentious villas em- 
bosomed in gardens and a view over a rolling valley covered 
with pine-woods. The great drawback has always been the 
red dust, which swirls round one unexpectedly in the Joburg 
streets and is ruinous, I am told, to the ladies' toilets. There 
is, however, comparatively little dust in the high-lying suburb 
of Park Town. 

After these visits I went down to Cape Town and saw 
Rhodes there. The famous Mount Nelson Hotel had not yet 
been built, the position being made accessible later by tram 
lines. Everyone put up at the Royal or Sea Point. At Cape 
Town I met Sir Henry (later Lord) Loch, then High Com- 
missioner, and discovered from him that he was an old friend 
of my father's and had been in the same regiment in India in 
1844. He was very friendly to me on this account, and during 
my administrative work I corresponded with him regularly. 
Loch was one of the few men who left South Africa at the 
end of his term without leaving his reputation in that "grave" 
which has swallowed so many. He was in these days very 
prudent and non-committal, and I recollect that Rhodes was 
by no means certain as to what line he would take towards 
the projected occupation of Mashonaland. 

Matters were now nearly ripe for the latter, and at this 
point I may give a bird's-eye view of the situation for the ben- 
efit of readers who may have forgotten the sequence in this 
page of English history. The point at issue was, not whether 
the authority of the native chief who ruled in Matabeleland 



SOUTH AFRICA AND RHODES III 

should be disturbed, but who was to do it. The Boers were 
anxious to secure the Land of Promise, the Portuguese were 
nibbling at Mashonaland, and Germany was casting longing 
eyes from her post of vantage on the west coast. In 1887 the 
territories of Matabeleland and Mashonaland were subject to 
Lobengula, son of the great chief Moselikatze who had been 
driven north by the Boers. He had conquered the Mashona 
and desolated their land — the flower of the South African 
territories. In 1888, at Rhodes' instigation, the British Gov- 
ernment obtained a treaty with Lobengula (a despotic Zulu 
ruler of the usual type) and by this treaty he engaged not to 
make any agreement with a foreign Power or to sell or cede 
his lands without the sanction of the British High Commis- 
sioner. This constituted a British protectorate over Matabele- 
land and Mashonaland, but without effective occupation this 
could not be maintained, especially in view of Lobengula's 
very doubtful claims over a good portion of the territory thus 
ear -marked. As has been said, Portugal on the east, Germany 
on the west, and the Transvaal on the south were "nibbling"." 
Various syndicates were despatched to seek concessions from 
Lobengula, and an important one, known as the Rudd conces- 
sion, was secured by Rudd, Rochfort Maguire and F. R. 
Thompson. The various interests involved were amalgamated 
in one company in 1889 by Rhodes, and under these circum- 
stances the British South Africa Company was born. The 
charter was obtained in October, 1889, which granted to it the 
right to construct railways and telegraphs, to promote trade 
and colonisation, and finally to develop the mineral and other 
concessions. The names of the directors to whom the charter 
was granted were the Dukes of Fife and Abercorn, Lord Gif- 
ford,"Mr. Rhodes, Mr. Beit, Mr. (now Lord) Grey and Mr. 
Cawson, and the capital was only one million sterling. To 
give practical effect to this charter it was decided that a pioneer 
column should go up and establish itself in the heart of the 
country, and I was to accompany it and report on its progress, 
and if the settlement was successfully accomplished to estab- 
lish civil government and draw up the elementary regulations 
for the new community. 



CHAPTER XII 

MASHONALAND AND GROOT SCHUUR 

The Rhodesian pioneers consisted of two hundred armed 
and mounted English and South African Volunteers, organ- 
ised and commanded by Major Frank Johnson, and five hun- 
dred mounted police specially raised for the purpose, and ad- 
mirably equipped with arms, mountain and machine guns, elec- 
tric light and other appliances, the whole under the command 
of Colonel Pennefather of the Inniskilling Dragoons, a regi- 
ment which had had great experience in the Zulu wars. The 
applications for inclusion in these two forces came in by hun- 
dreds, and young fellows with and without introductions were 
always turning up at the Kimberley office and worried all of 
us considerably. We took with us the well-known hunter, 
F. C. Selous, as a guide and scout. He had already been nearly 
twenty years in the country, and hunted practically all over 
it, and knew the native peoples and their ways, both Matabele 
and Mashonas. Colenbrander, the Africander scout, started 
with us but returned to Buluwayo when Jameson joined the 
column and stayed there to keep an eye on Lobengula. 

My last news from home, which reached me at Macloutsie 
before we started on a march which was considered to be full 
of danger, was that my father was dead and that one of my 
sisters, Mrs. Symington, was near her end. I was consider- 
ably worried by the thought that my stepmother and her chil- 
dren might be left badly off, while I might not get through 
our enterprise and be in a position to help her if necessary. 
Fortunately, however, my father had made full provision for 
her and his young family, and was even able to leave a few 
hundreds to each of his elder children. I did not know this 
till later and left Macloutsie with rather a heavy heart. A 
nephew was now with me, a son of my sister in America, who 
had joined us a few days after the start. 



MASHON ALAND AND GROOT SCHUUR 113 

We rode in column formation. Selous with his scouts (most 
of them lent by Khama) went on in front and spread out on 
either side, the Pioneers and police surrounded the waggons, 
and the guns brought up the rear, with more scouts behind. 
With all the precautions we could take, however, we were con- 
scious that in the broken and scrubby country, which became 
more and more difficult as we approached Mashonaland, we 
could have been cut up in a few moments by a determined at- 
tack. We were anxious and on the alert until we reached the 
open country, but on the high plateau of Mashonaland we 
breathed more freely. At night the waggons were laagered 
and the electric searchlight played over the surrounding coun- 
try to reveal any enemies who might have tried to stalk us. 
The scattered bands of Mashonas must have thought wonder- 
ful things of this strange body of men, so curiously clad and 
armed, who called to their aid a great white eye which watched 
over them at night and pierced into the heart of the jungle with 
its rays. To get the guns and waggons along we had to cut 
through the banks of the drifts and sometimes to make cordu- 
roy roads. Here and there the track had to be cut through 
thick jungle. 

I remember the bivouac at night, when we took our well- 
earned rest rolled in our karosses and mackintosh sheets, the 
camp fire flickering and a savoury steam going up from cook- 
ing pots. The troopers round their fire sang lustily in the still 
African night, while the smoke and scent of their pipes, 
charged with the Boer tobacco which is good only on the veld 
but unsurpassable there, filled the air with a peculiar pungency. 
A favourite song, of which the refrain has stuck to me ever 
since, dealt in true Tommy fashion with life's little ironies and 
had appropriate colour : 



'There goes the I.D.B. ! 

Are ye there, Moriar-r-i-ty?" 



with a rich Irish brogue. This never failed to bring down the 
house. The great, white eye of our electric light attracted the 
wild animals, of which the country was then full, but also 
kept them at bay. When we got on to the high veld we saw 
large herds of giraffes, zebra and buck, and later on, in the 
north of Mashonaland, elephants and lions. Gold prospecting 



ii4 DAN TO BEERSHEBA 

at a later date was complicated by the dangers from these 
beasts, and I remember one man had the novel experience of 
seeing three lions at three different places on the same day. 
Rhodes himself once had a narrow escape from a lion on his 
way up from Beira. He had gone out for a morning stroll 
in his pyjamas and was seen racing back as hard as he could 
pelt, having nearly walked into a lion at a turn in the path. 

After a ten weeks march the Pioneers accomplished their 
journey of 450 miles, building four forts in which they left 
garrisons on the way to maintain the line of communication. 
On September 20, 1890, they reached their destination, Mount 
Hampden, some ten miles north of the spot where the town 
of Salisbury now stands. 

On the way up, shortly after reaching the plateau, with a 
party which included Selous, Jameson (who had now joined 
the column) and Fiennes, I started off to make a treaty with 
the Chief of the Manika and obtain for the British South Af- 
rica Company concessions for the mineral and other rights in 
his territory. I was desirous of obtaining some reliable infor- 
mation and, if possible, ocular evidence of that ever-vanishing 
and hitherto unknown quantity — the will-o'-the-wisp of so- 
called Portuguese "occupation." On our way up through 
Mashonaland, not a trace or vestige of the existence of the 
Portuguese at any time, much less of a present occupation of 
this country, to which they had laid claim with much well- 
simulated indignation a year before, could be detected, or at 
any rate was visible to the naked eye. The ruins we saw — 
at Zimbabye, for instance, and other places — could never by 
the wildest stretch of imagination be ascribed to Portuguese 
handiwork, or admitted for one moment as fulfilling their in- 
variable contention of "ancient ruins and traditions/' upon 
which they laid so much stress and based their chimerical 
rights in this part of the world. Until we reached Manika 
there was nothing of general interest to record. We passed 
through some of the most charming scenery imaginable, cross- 
ing numerous streams of clear, swiftly flowing water over 
rocky beds, winding their way amongst perfect wooded moun- 
tain scenery, of which one could find the exact counterpart in 
favoured portions of either Scotland or Wales. 

The importance of Manika lay not only in the fact that it 
brought the British South Africa Company's frontier nearer 



MASHONALAND AND GROOT SCHUUR 115 

the coast and put a definite stop to Portuguese expansion, but 
also that at that time great things were expected of the Manika 
goldfields, which had been worked from time immemorial. 
About Rhodesian goldfields generally I shall have more to say 
later on. 

On the way to Manika Jameson had a bad accident in being 
thrown from his horse, and had to be left behind. I have a 
characteristic letter written by him at this juncture, which is 
well worth quoting because of some little side-lights on the 
local politics of the day. After some details about food, wag- 
gons, and trading stuffs, he says: 

"My infernal side gets more shaky instead of better — the 
torments of the damned after trying to get up for a few min- 
utes. So, as I would only be an encumbrance to Selous at 
present, I am going on to Mount Hampden (our original idea 
for a terminus, about ten miles north of Salisbury) to await 
him there or join him after you return. As the tent is the only 
means of making a hammock to be carried in I am using it. 
Tell Selous I will bring or send him another if he goes on. 
The only alternative is to lie here indefinitely — poor sport. The 
natives brought some good gold here yesterday — a lot of Portu- 
guese bastards here evidently trading in gold. I suppose you 
would put a P.S. to your concession form giving the most ex- 
tensive limits Umtassa will allow — to the coast if possible — and 
get him to sign it as well as the form. That would include 
everything. Love to all, wish you every success." 

Upon the conclusion of the Manika treaty Mr. Selous and 
two others of my mission rode on to Massi-Kessi, where, it 
was said, some Portuguese were established. Selous and his 
party on their way to that place met a party of East Coast 
blacks in charge of two Portuguese officials (one a captain in 
the Portuguese army, the other a civil engineer) recently ar- 
rived from the coast and bearing a letter to me — I had re- 
mained behind in the neighbourhood of Umtassa's kraal — pro- 
testing against the presence of the representatives of the 
company in Manika as well as Mashonaland generally. On 
hearing that Selous, who informed them where I could be 
found, wished to go on to Massi-Kessi, they intimated their 
willingness to fall in with that arrangement, and Selous went 
on and visited the Baron de Rezende. The latter may have 
had, under normal circumstances, a small retinue of black 



u6 DAN TO BEERSHEBA 

"soldiers"; but these, it is understood, had been told off sum- 
marily to swell the cortege enorme, avec un drapeau deploye 
(as the party was afterwards described) despatched late the 
evening before with the letter of protest to myself. Every 
nerve had no doubt been strained to render the cortege of as 
imposing an appearance as possible, with the object of duly 
impressing me with the solid and substantial, not to say mili- 
tary, nature of Portuguese occupation. Beyond this one iso- 
lated representative of the Mozambique Company, however, 
Selous failed to trace the existence of one single other resident 
Portuguese, either official, colonist, trader, or miner. There 
were certainly two or three engineers in the neighbourhood, 
temporarily engaged in surveying, and there were the two 
recently arrived officials from the coast already mentioned. 

The contrast between this and the occupation of Mashona- 
land by the British South Africa Company struck us forcibly 
soon after. At Fort Salisbury — to say nothing of what had 
been done at the various stations below — within one month of 
the arrival of the expedition several hundred prospectors were 
scouring the country in all directions in search of gold, forts 
had been built, huts were springing up in every direction, postal 
communication was punctually kept up from the base, and the 
general work of administration was being soundly and firmly 
established. 

The difficulties between England and Portugal were, after 
much further negotiation, happily ended by the ratification of 
a new agreement, dated June u, 1891. This agreement, which 
gave Mashonaland access to the port of Beira through the 
Portuguese territory, together with the agreement concluded 
with Germany in the previous year, brought about a general 
arrangement of Central and Southern Africa between the 
Powers interested in that region. It was, of course, a great 
drawback that Rhodesia could not secure a coast line, and a 
great deal of our thoughts and energies in the first months of 
our occupation were bent to this end. It was expected by the 
Company that the British Government would support us in 
any concession we might have obtained "even down to the sea 
coast," but unfortunately the Portuguese position in Beira was 
too well defined, or at all events I thought so. Had I cared 
to despatch a filibustering expedition to seize Beira I could 
have done so but, as I was now perfectly aware, with the cer- 



MASHON ALAND AND GROOT SCHUUR 117 

tainty that in the case of accident I should be disavowed. The 
temper displayed by the Portuguese over the affair of Um- 
tassa's kraal was, moreover, a plain indication of possible com- 
plications. I think I forgot to mention that our prisoner, 
d'Andrada, turned out to be a near relation of some very high 
personages, and his private influence, which extended beyond 
his own country, was highly inconvenient. 

I must now go back to the point when I rejoined the Pioneer 
column at Mount Hampden, soon after which we moved on 
to Salisbury. The prospectors began to spread over the coun- 
try — at least, many of them. Others, who had expected to 
find gold in chunks ready to be picked up, squatted in their 
waggons and waited for the liquor to arrive. All had been 
given three months' rations by the .Company but were expected 
to find meat for themselves, and I find in a plaintive letter 
from the officer left in command when I went away to inspect 
the country, that these so-called prospectors surrounded him 
day and night asking him for meat, "Of which," he adds with 
some misgivings, "I really have none to give." Within a few 
weeks of our arrival the rains set in, and were unusually severe 
that year. The rivers rose in our rear and cut our communi- 
cations, and as we had travelled very light, expecting waggons 
of supplies to follow, we were soon on short commons. Meat 
was to be had for the shooting, but native meal was difficult 
to obtain and we had not the trading stuff to barter for it. 
Tea, coffee, sugar, and even salt we ran out of at headquarters, 
and the prospectors were short of everything and suffered 
severely from malarial fever. In short, we had a very rough 
time. I had one anxious week, having gone out to a mining 
camp with a brother of Dr. Jameson. We were isolated by 
the river, which was in spate in front, and by the track behind 
us, impassable from the heavy rain. We took shelter in a hut 
and subsisted on the scanty food we were carrying and what 
the natives in a kraal could give us, but it was a trying ex- 
perience. 

Our position at Salisbury became so desperate that at last 
I was forced to send an expedition to Tete, a Portuguese trad- 
ing post on the Zambesi, and thence they brought up a couple 
of waggon loads of supplies, but the journey was a terrible one 
at that time of year and cost several lives. As soon as the 
rains were over conditions improved very much and the work 



n8 DAN TO BEERSHEBA 

of organisation proceeded apace. Among the steps to be taken 
were the formation of a headquarters at Salisbury, the estab- 
lishment of postal communication, the laying out of townships, 
the creation of mining districts with commissioners, the deal- 
ing with applications for mining rights and licenses, the ad- 
justment of disputes among the settlers, the establishment of 
hospitals, the preparation and introduction of mining and other 
laws and regulations, the initiation of a survey, the opening 
out of roads to the various mining centres, and the despatch of 
missions to native chiefs. 

Naturally, under the conditions of laying the foundation 
stone of a colony, in which commercial interests were so large- 
ly represented, there were many strings being pulled, many 
intrigues, and a certain amount of friction, but the general 
behaviour, especially of the police, was excellent. My own 
position was not an easy one by any means, for I was between 
Scylla and Charybdis. On the one hand a body of settlers 
who were not under the same control as they would have been 
in a Crown colony, and over whom during the first few months, 
until provisional laws and regulations had been promulgated, 
I had no real power ; and on the other my employers who were 
not accustomed to the forms and procedure usual in official 
communications — a fact which enormously increased my work. 
The principle of undivided control pressed for by me was not 
recognised, partly, I think, because Rhodes was anxious from 
the first that his alter ego, Jameson, who would be nble as no 
one else could to interpret his policy, should really control the 
destiny of the colony although he could not spare him for the 
initial spade work. Jameson was occupied in journeying to 
and fro and in affairs of high policy, and was only in Mashona- 
land for a very short time during my tenure of office, but he 
was appointed managing-director, and after I left he took over 
the administration. My departure in the autumn of 1891 was 
rendered necessary by the fact that I could not face another 
rainy season without leave, having suffered severely from the 
strain of the work and the hardships involved. At the same time 
was found practicable to disband the military force, Colonel 
Pennefather and other officers returning to their regiments. 
"Pat" Forbes remained in charge of a volunteer force nomi- 
nally 500 strong, now the only force, military or police, in the 
country — a sure indication that our first year had been success- 



MASHONALAND AND GROOT SCHUUR 119 

ful in establishing the colony on a secure and peaceful founda- 
tion. Appended is a facsimile letter from Mr. Rhodes, one of 
the few I ever received in his own writing — the labour evinced 
in the heavy irregular scrawl is indicative of his dislike for the 
manual labour of writing. There is no secret history involved, 
though it is an amusing little sidelight on the sort of question 
we had to tackle, and the difficulties in our path — by no means 
always of native origin. 

At Cape Town I stayed with Rhodes at his famous house, 
Groot Schuur, once a granary, as its name implies, and for 
long in the possession of the Hofmeyr family. When he 
became Prime Minister in 'go he tenanted the house and bought 
it a couple of years later. In '96 it was burnt down and re- 
stored by Baker in the form which it now wears — larger and 
more elaborate, but in the style of the old house. No one who 
ever saw Groot Schuur, even in those early days, could forget 
it — the avenue of pines and oaks, the scrolled white gable-ends, 
quaint windows and moulded chimney-pots, the foreground of 
Dutch garden, and at the back the three terraces with their 
fringe of pines and great clumps of arum lilies. Behind it all 
the bush-clad slopes topped by the krantses of Table Moun- 
tain and the Devil's Peak — a wonderful site for a house and 
a wonderful house for the site. 

The interior was more homely and comfortable than elabo- 
rate, and the modern house seemed to me in 1904 less of a 
home and more of a museum, which of course it is since the 
master left it. Much of the old furniture now contained in 
it was collected from all parts of South Africa for the new 
house. Rhodes was always fond of old things and especially 
of curios, and every visitor saw the wooden bowl brought from 
Zimbabye, and the curious carved birds, which he liked to 
believe were Phallic symbols. There was a coin of Antoninus 
Pius from the same treasure trove. More interesting to me 
was the library, a really good one, containing many classics and 
good modern series, such as the "History of the Nations." 
The table was very good, and the service, on a modest scale 
with one white man-servant and coloured underlings, was quite 
adequate. 

Groot Schuur was, from the first, the scene of great hospi- 
tality. At the time of my visit Rhodes was engaged in the 
heavy task of placating the Dutch element and keeping them 



120 DAN TO BEERSHEBA 

in hand, while the northern expansion was being carried out, 
and at the same time soothing the susceptibilities of the British 
Africanders who could not but fear that the northern expan- 
sion might lead to a shifting of the centre of gravity and thus 
leave the Cape stranded and isolated in South Africa. Con- 
sequently one met at Groot Schur not only the Bond leaders 
but politicians of every shade. Jan Hofmeyr, the "Mole," quiet 
and secretive but bearing the reputation (which I think he de- 
served) of being the straightest man in South Africa, was very 
often there, and John X. Merriman, the brilliant Englishman, 
who was to identify himself with the Bond and is now Prime 
Minister, was another interesting figure. Merriman was at this 
time a great friend of Rhodes and took many morning rides 
with him — a friendship which terminated abruptly and left bit- 
terness behind when Rhodes "betrayed the Dutch." Merri- 
man is one of the wittiest and most caustic of men, but like 
many others of his calibre is, I think, best in opposition. He 
is credited with having spoken of "The sons of Belial — I mean 
Balliol !" to indicate the young British officials who were his 
betes noirs when introduced by Lord Milner after the war. 
Balliol men remain "sons of Belial" to this day without any 
reflection on their characters ! 

Another witty Biblical perversion related to the demand of 
a section of the Cape farmers for some facilities for the trans- 
port of agricultural produce. Although they did not get what 
they wanted the minister for railways, in a gracious speech, 
promised to carry local building materials at reduced rates. 
"You have asked for bread and he gives you a stone!" was 
Merriman's apt comment. 

On my way down I had met Lord Randolph Churchill on his 
last melancholy journey, and had two hours' conversation with 
him. One could not help being pained by the obvious signs 
of disease and mental wear and tear. Only this year a paper 
on our East African Empire was read by me at the Colonial 
Institute, at which Lord Randolph's son, now a Cabinet min- 
ister, took the chair. I could not help thinking of my last in- 
terview with his father. 

This was, though I did not suppose it for a moment, the 
last time I ever saw Cecil Rhodes. He was very kind and 
cordial to me, and offered me six months' leave and the option 
of returning to my post if I liked; but I felt that the avenues 



MASHONALAND AND GROOT SCHUUR 121 

to promotion in that direction were few and the conditions of 
service not such as would suit me. I was, however, given by 
him six months' leave on full pay, though it was understood 
that I was not coming back. I do not think my decision about 
Rhodesia was unwise. The development of the country was 
not to proceed on ordinary lines, since the administration was 
complicated by the financial question. Rhodes originally be- 
lieved that the country was so heavily mineralised from end 
to end as to be a certain success from the start, and counted 
on finding a second banket reef which would at once bring 
in a large and prosperous community. Had he known, as he 
knew later, that though the country is "mineralised from end 
to end" the gold deposit is of a character to make its exploita- 
tion an industry, but not an Eldorado, he would have followed 
an entirely different policy. He meant the mines to act as 
a magnet to population and capital, and thought the develop- 
ment of the country would follow. Now it has become patent 
that Rhodesia must depend on her land as well as her minerals, 
but the first false steps have to be painfully recovered, and 
Rhodesia's prospects, after eighteen years, are still unrealised 
though much has been done in the country and its possibilities 
are as great as ever. Under the abnormal conditions attend- 
ing the early development of Rhodesia, I do not see in what 
direction a career would have opened to me. Business ability, 
essential in dealing with the complicated situation, was lacking 
on my part, and I had an utter distaste for the atmosphere of 
mining speculation and company promoting which pervaded 
the country. Moreover, although much attracted by the cli- 
mate and the country I could not, after my experiences in the 
East, enjoy the task of dealing with natives who had to all 
seeming neither a history nor a future. I have always been 
proud to have played a part, however humble, in securing a 
part of this country for the Empire ; but when the pioneer stage 
was over, and the patriotic motif had to be subordinated to the 
question of dividends, my first enthusiasm began to wane. In 
short, I was not drawn towards the work in Rhodesia by any 
strong attractions, and from the point of view of worldly suc- 
cess I have never had reason to deplore the fact that I decided 
not to return. Rhodesia has not proved an avenue to promo- 
tion or distinction, and the expense of living has always handi- 
capped those to whom salary is a consideration. 



122 DAN TO BEERSHEBA 

Revisiting Rhodesia the other day, I was amused at the 
question of a youngster who asked me where "Government 
House" was in my time ? Mine was a mud hut with a thatched 
roof, and I wrote home that it was extremely comfortable and 
actually had windows, as I knew from the draughts — no glass, 
but a sheet of cotton nailed over the framework. I contem- 
plated a more elaborate establishment, and had thoughts of 
importing my stepmother and youngest half-sister to preside 
over it, but I warned them that no ladies had entered the coun- 
try as yet and that of trained service there was none. The 
men who fared best were those who, like Selous, had Zulu 
body servants who had followed them for years and knew how 
to provide for a rough kind of comfort. My stepmother, in 
answer to my suggestion, wrote that I might marry, to which 
I replied — and the statement is extant to prove the vanity of 
a man's judgment on himself — "I shall never marry. I am 
too old, in spirit as well as in years, to venture on such an un- 
dertaking." Had I but known, the lady who was to change 
my mind on this subject had just become acquainted with my 
family circle, and on my return to London my fate was de- 
cided, although the event tarried some seven years. 



CHAPTER XIII 

A VISIT TO THE UNITED STATES 

The return to England in the middle of the winter was not 
well calculated, for nothing depresses one more after the clear 
African sky than the grey pall which too often spreads over 
these islands during the months between November and April. 
I was, however, anxious to see my stepmother and brothers 
and sisters and to learn their plans for the future, for I had half 
a mind to settle down with them somewhere and devote myself 
to literature. 

The spring of 1892 found me enjoying a holiday in Eng- 
land practically for the first time. It will be remembered that 
on my first furlough home (in 1881) I only stayed a few 
months and did a lot of work in that time; my second stay (in 
1882) was as short, and even more strenuous; while the third, 
before I went out to Upper Burma, was only some five months, 
and during that time I was writing and lecturing incessantly. 
Naturally, the period (from August to November in 1889) 
which preceded my sudden departure for South Africa was 
too anxious a time to be enjoyed, so that I had practically 
never in my life had a complete rest from work, travel, and 
worry. The London season being on, and my stepmother and 
her youngest girl now in town, I much enjoyed the novel ex- 
perience of taking them about. My sister was then studying 
at the studio of Ludovici, and I was invited to teas there and 
used sometimes to go to fetch her. It was a joke against me 
that I did not fancy studio teas, expressing doubts as to 
whether the cups had been properly washed, and declaring that 
the cake tasted of palette-knife! But fate lurked behind the 
teacups and the painty cake, and a very young lady in a red 
overall succeeded in impressing her image on my not very sus^ 
ceptible heart. I arranged parties carrees, in which she was 
included, but I fear I did not make the most of my opportuni- 
ties, for she assures me that at Earl's Court in the evening, 

123 



124 DAN TO BEERSHEBA 

under the fairy lights and to the music of a Strauss waltz, I 
discussed with her the unification of Germany and the work 
accomplished by von Stein! The end of this episode came 
with a party up the river, which was to have been an idyll, 
but turned out a fiasco. We started from Westbourne Park 
in a light drizzle and the carriage packed to suffocation. Our 
party — one of my carefully-planned fours — was unexpectedly 
increased by the untimely appearance of a young brother and 
a friend, who insisted on joining us. The brother could have 
been choked off, but the friend, for reasons of his own, was 
impervious to my hints. We reached Henley in a downpour. 
We walked along the river bank through torrents of rain. We 
lunched at the hotel in dryness and comfort, but by this time 
my temper was horrid, for to add to everything I had a liver 
attack! After lunch we sat in a damp summer-house, and 
even the geniality of Duncan Louttit could not dispel the gloom 
which had settled over us. The guest of the occasion decided 
that I must be a very unpleasant man to live with, and on our 
arrival back in town — the sun came out as we reached it — 
she elected to be escorted home by Duncan ! We were not to 
meet again for seven years. 

An adventurous spirit in the journalistic world with whom 
I was acquainted was the American, Stillman, who started life 
as a landscape painter. In 1852 he went on behalf of Louis 
Kossuth to Hungary to carry away the Crown jewels, which 
had been hidden during the revolution. Later he was United 
States consul at Rome and in Greece, but took to literature and 
then joined the Times. From his conversation I got my first 
interest in the politics of South-Eastern Europe and in the Bal- 
kans generally. I think I met him at Sir Edwin Arnold's 
house, a very hospitable one, where the family circle formed 
rather an amusing mutual admiration society. Arnold's sec- 
ond wife, the daughter of Dr. Channing, a well-known Boston 
preacher, was talented and constantly dilated on the genius of 
her husband, while he led one round to admire her paintings, 
and the rest of the household sat and worshipped at both the 
shrines! Arnold accumulated a perfect museum of foreign 
(chiefly Eastern) orders which were a great topic of conver- 
sation. 

After a short time life in England began to bore me. My 
future course was still undecided, but in any case I was rest- 



A VISIT TO THE UNITED STATES 125 

less for fresh fields and pastures new. Having a sister and 
brother in America and many friends, and feeling that to un- 
derstand Welt Politik (which was my desire) it was essential 
to see the West as well as the East, I packed up my traps and 
started for America, travelling all over not only the Northern 
but the Southern States, and spending many months with my 
sister in Atlanta, Georgia, where she lived for the education 
of her children. I was immensely entertained by my Ameri- 
can nephews and nieces, for the freedom of manner and many 
of the social customs were strange to me. I remember vividly 
my sensations when, in a house where my sister and I were 
calling one evening, some young fellows arrived to see the 
girls of the family, and our hostess rose from her comfortable 
"rocker" and said to us, "Well, I guess we had better go into 
the back parlour and leave the young folks to enjoy them- 
selves !" 

So many charming novels have been written which give 
pictures of social conditions in the Southern States after "the 
s'render" that it is perhaps foolish for me to add my stone to 
the cairn, but I cannot forget the vivid impression made on 
me at this time. Coming from the Northern States, where the 
whole atmopshere was full of work, hustle, money, enterprise, 
and nervous tension, I dropped into a society where the princi- 
pal occupation seemed to be the struggle to make both ends meet 
on the most slender resources, and yet where worldly success 
was of less account than an honourable name and ancestry. 
From the atmosphere of equality — an equality in which, as 
has been well said, every man is "as good as another and a bit 
better" — I came into a social world full of subtle class distinc- 
tions. The fact that everyone "in society" was poor did not 
detract from their claims on consideration based on their fam- 
ily position. In no society in Europe would one meet with 
a greater degree of aristocratic exclusiveness, though it was 
kept up with a delicate high-bred absence of assumption. One 
recognised at once that the underlying principle of this society 
was the fact that, like Englishmen in India or Burma, the 
"best people" were a sahib class, living among a race of in- 
ferior civilisation. The destruction of the fabric of their society 
by the entire reversal of social conditions in the "reconstruc- 
tion period" had driven them to what appeared like an exag- 



126 DAN TO BEERSHEBA 

geration of the sense of caste — in the struggle to preserve their 
position. 

It was impossible not to admire the beautiful Southern 
women, many of whom toiled in menial capacities during the 
day but received in the evening in their refined if shabby 
homes, and entertained us with the gaiety and ease of those 
to whom social intercourse is the chief affair of life. I re- 
member one woman particularly, delicate and fragile in ap- 
pearance, who had been a great belle in her youth and the 
mistress of a fine establishment in her early married years. 
She hawked books for sale during the day. It was only the 
shadow in her eyes that gave any indication of her sufferings 
when she entertained her callers in the evening. It was not 
"good form" to talk about "better days" or indeed to draw 
attention, directly or indirectly, to the fact that everything 
was not as it should be. Among men, however, the conver- 
sation ran greatly on the struggle many were having 
to keep the remnant of their estates. The word "mort- 
gage" was omniously familiar and hung over our spirits 
like a pall. Bitterness against the North had not by any 
means died out, and a Northerner was still a foreigner 
and an outsider, not to be tolerated as a son-in-law, though 
young folks sometimes thought differently. I wonder if any 
of these old-world communities are still to be found, or if the 
great industrial expansion of the South has swept them away 
on a wave of prosperity! The generation then growing up 
was not likely to perpetuate either the sentiments or the preju- 
dices of their parents, or the pathetic futility of their attitude 
towards the forces at work in their country. 

Among my most interesting experiences was a visit to the 
old home of John C. Calhoun, the celebrated Southern states- 
man, in the hills of South Carolina. The house, a modest one, 
but beautifully situated, was, I think, preserved by the piety 
of his descendants as a relic of him. The walls were hung 
with portraits, and a valuable collection of his letters was 
preserved in strong boxes, at which I was allowed to have a 
look. My sister and I were specially interested to find out 
if he belonged to the same family as ourselves, and from the 
correspondence gathered that this was actually the case, though 
his forbears had come to America via Donegal where they were 
settled for some generations. All the Colquhouns, Calhoons 



A VISIT TO THE UNITED STATES 127 

and other variants of the name must be, in fact, descended from 
the Loch Lomond clan, though I am not prepared to say that 
the original Kilpatrick who got the Colchune lands may not 
have come from Ireland ! 

In John Calhoun's face we thought could be traced the tradi- 
tional family features, and particularly the high-bridged nose 
and fine forehead which were so marked in my own father. 
He had a French mother, whose beautiful portrait, full of life 
and spirit, also hung on the walls, and from her he got the 
flashing dark eye which was one of his characteristics. I feel 
proud to be able to claim kinship with one of America's great- 
est men, whom I have always admired not only as a statesman 
but as a philosopher, and I was much interested to meet the 
handsome and talented descendant of his, Miss Eleanor Cal- 
houn, to whom reference has already been made. 

Atlanta, where my sister lived, had only recently started on 
the career of industrial expansion which now makes it a great 
railway and manufacturing centre. While I was there I went 
up to see the Chicago Exhibition, and heard an amusing story 
illustrating the coolness of an Atlantian animated by Southern 
pride. A Yankee said to him, "You come from Atlanta? Busy 
little place! We always call it the Chicago of the South !" 
"You don't say !" answered the Southerner. "I call that a 
genuine coincidence. We always call Chicago the Atlanta of 
the No'th !" I was told also — a less authenticated story — that 
a Chicago man died and came in due course to a Certain Place. 
A spirit met him at the gate and showed him over his new 
abode. He saw miles and miles of business quarters and 
streets, and the more he saw the more enthusiastic he became. 
"Why, Heaven is better than Chicago," he cried. The spirit 
answered, "This is not Heaven !" 

Being determined to see something of America outside the 
towns, I made several journeys by rail and buck -board and 
stopped at farm houses, meeting, of course, none but Ameri- 
cans, and even in towns and hotels avoiding the few Britons 
who might be seen there. I found my country and people 
excessively unpopular, and my own passport to favour was 
the fact that I was "Scoto-Irish" — the generic term for all 
Celts in America. Had I been English my welcome would have 
been a very poor one, and I was often forced to listen to a 
criticism of my country which was founded on the perverted 



128 DAN TO BEERSHEBA 

information conveyed in the Press and the school books of 
the day. My own nephews and nieces waved the Stars and 
Stripes under my nose and rubbed in the iniquities we had 
committed on every possible occasion, the fact that both their 
father and mother were British weighing nothing against their 
own poignant sense of American nationality. This was my 
first glimpse of a subject which has been much discussed since 
then — the power of this great country for digesting aliens and 
turning them out American citizens. No traveller in the United 
States has failed to be struck by the inoculation of patriotism 
in the schools, and its effect on the children of immigrants. 
In Boston I met an Englishman whose loyalty to his own na- 
tion had never even permitted him to take out naturalisation 
papers, though he was settled there for life. One day, walk- 
ing over Boston Common with his small boy, aged seven, the 
latter gave his father a little shove and said slyly, pointing with 
his finger, "That's where we whopped you, poppa!" 

An Irish lady of my acquaintance whose parents settled in 
Virginia when she was nearly grown up, volunteered one day 
to take a geography class in school for one of the teachers who 
was ill. The subject was Europe. She stood up before the 
map and, pointing to it, began, "Europe is the smallest but the 

most important of the continents " She never finished the 

sentence. The class rose as one child and mobbed her, and 
as she would not retract, the lesson had to be abandoned. 

A great improvement has, I believe, taken place in the school 
books, which give a more just appreciation of Great Britain 
without detracting from American pride in their own national 
achievements. I say I "believe," because only three years ago 
I had occasion to dip into some "Readers," and found a 
rechauffe of stories about English cruelty to American pris- 
oners which may be historically accurate, but are given an 
entirely false perspective by being taken out of their context 
and served up for the consumption of children to whom such 
anecdotes are apt to be far more vivid than the greater move- 
ments of which they are part. At the period of my first visit 
the education of the negro was only just beginning to engage 
attention, and was violently opposed by many people in the 
South. I recollect many stories of the hardships and even 
dangers encountered by the Northern school-marms who had 
to be imported to teach the negro schools. At a later date 



A VISIT TO THE UNITED STATES 129 

much time and consideration were devoted by me to this 
"Black problem," but it is too involved for any discussion here. 
I may say that my acquaintance with the South, and the con- 
ditions of life of a small white population living in the midst 
of a black cloud, prevented me from adopting the Northern 
attitude, but at the same time I have always felt, in Africa as 
in America, that the negro race must be helped on an upward 
path of civilisation. A witty definition of the attitude of the 
North and South respectively towards the negro problem runs 
as follows : "The North sympathises with the negro — the South 
with a negro." This was the epigram of a coloured man, and it 
is true, for while the negro in the abstract — in principle — ap- 
peals to the theoretic justice of the Northener, the colour line 
is really drawn hard-and-fast in the North as in the South, while 
in the latter long and often affectionate association with black 
people as servants and nurses makes the Southerner kinder 
and more sympathetic to individual negroes. I remember the 
affectionate familiarity of the old mammies and field hands 
on my sister's plantation in Alabama, and their intimate ac- 
quaintance with the family affairs which they regarded as their 
own. Many of them, of course, had been born in slavery, for 
this was only thirty years after the war. I particularly like 
the story of the old negro butler who, thinking one of his 
young mistresses was neglecting a guest at dinner, took occa- 
sion to whisper to her, "A little more condessation to de right, 
missy !" Everyone knows the part played by negro servants 
in running the estates when their masters went to the war, and 
often acting as the sole supports and protectors of white mis- 
tresses when the latter lost their own men folk. I regret to 
say my sister writes to me that the black people have now 
grown so insolent that it is not considered safe for a white lady 
to live on a plantation unprotected. I have a lively recollection 
of the surprise shown by an American lady a few years since 
in the West Indies, when she saw white women living on 
lonely plantations from which their husbands or sons were 
often absent for days at a time. One lady was asked, "Are 
you not frightened?" She replied, in all good faith, "Oh, no! 
there are plenty of hands on the estate, and so few white loafers 
come this way !" And there is no Judge Lynch in Jamaica ! 

The farming population of Ohio, where I also visited, was 
a great contrast to that of Georgia or Carolina. In the former 



130 DAN TO BEERSHEBA 

I was driven in smart buck-boards, behind spanking horses, 
and the houses of my hosts were full of homely comfort, and 
not a few contained books and music. . The food was plentiful 
and good of its sort, but oh! the horrible indigestion induced 
by American middle-class cooking. In the South, where tra- 
ditions of creole cookery linger, one gets the most delicious 
food in the world, and the tables of the rich in the Eastern 
towns are most delicately furnished, but the genuine middle- 
class fare is only fit for an ostrich. Visions of "pie," of rich 
and oily turkeys with highly seasoned stuffing and sweet sauce, 
of steaks like leather and hot cakes like lead, of strong tea and 
weak coffee drunk in gallons with these meals, of fat boiled 
bacon and beans swimming in grease — the very memory gives 
me dyspepsia ! A patent "liver cure" is a sure cut to fortune 
in America! The farming communities were sociable, the 
whole tone of life full and free — a delightful country and peo- 
ple. The Southern farmers, on the contrary, scattered and 
isolated, struggling against adverse labour conditions and back- 
ward in their methods, were often ground down to that hope- 
less level of agricultural poverty which is the worst of all. 
Amusements were scarce, intellects were starved. The Sunday 
paper represented all they knew of the outside world. The poor 
white communities of the hill country presented the gravest 
social problem, and I do not think this blot on American civ- 
ilisation has yet been removed, judging from the reports I 
have recently seen of the Hargis feud. These family feuds 
have their counterpart in such countries as Sicily to-day, but 
the whole condition of the people who harbour them is more 
reminiscent of the Highland clans of Scotland in ruder times. 

The lawlessness displayed by these American highlanders, 
often degenerate and absolutely ignorant "poor whites," living 
in a semi-primitive manner in the mountains, but cherishing 
the traditions of "family," provides picturesque material for 
the sensational journalist or novelist. "Judge" Jim Hargis, 
with his twenty or more notches on his gun to show the num- 
ber of murders committed, is at last shot in his own store by 
his son to whom he had denied some request ! Wild justice — 
not the majesty of the law — rules in these regions. It is to 
be regretted that, even in parts of the United States where 
the "poor-white question" does not come in, the education 
which makes men patriots seems too often to fail to imbue 



A VISIT TO THE UNITED STATES 131 

them with a sense of the duties, as well as the rights, of citi- 
zenship. Lawlessness in her people is one of the great prob- 
lems of the United States to-day, a fact, no doubt, largely due 
to the admixture of races to whom the idea of law is not yet 
a tradition. I was immensely struck, on my first sojourn, by 
this disrespect for law, for although I had been in countries 
where civilisation was primitive I had nowhere encountered 
the deliberate contempt for the law and its processes which 
characterised many of my own friends and acquaintances. 
Many things which they disapproved they suffered rather than 
set the machinery of law in motion, regardless of the fact that, 
however uncertain that machinery might be, it must deteriorate 
with disuse, and that the way to improve it w T as not to ignore 
it. Everyone knows the stories of editors "out West," whose 
offices had to be barricaded against ousiaughts of offended 
readers. Perhaps it may be news to some people that at the 
end of the nineteenth century a Southern editor, whose public 
contained some of the fine fleur of American civilisation, might 
have a no less exciting existence. 

I knew one who went to his work warily every day. The 
office was situated in a square, and to reach it he had to pass 
down a street and cross the road. The crossing was the dan- 
gerous point. Down the street he had his shoulder to the wall 
and his "iron" handy. Then he took a good look to see if the 
coast was clear, and made a dart to the office door. Colonel 
X., with two big sons, was on the look-out for him to avenge 
some insult in the paper, but for some days the editor evaded 
him. An Englishman, a friend of mine, who was on his staff, 
was writing busily one evening when the office boy rushed in 
with the news that the editor was being murdered in the square. 
He seized his '"gun," threw himself downstairs and was just 
in time. The editor had his back to the wall and the colonel 
and his "boys" were taking shots at him. When my friend 
arrived on the scene and took steady aim they thought better 
of it and disappeared. The reason why more people are not 
killed in such an affray is that the six-shooter is not a weapon 
of precision in the hands of an angry man. The principal 
danger is to lookers-on, and they usually have the sense to get 
out of the way. My friend's "gun" was not loaded as a matter 
of fact, but it was an effective weapon for all that, and saved 
the editor's life. There was no prosecution on account of this 



132 DAN TO BEERSHEBA 

as it was known the jury would not convict. Instances of a 
flagrant kind have failed to secure conviction from a prejudiced 
jury, and this, to a great extent, is the root of the mischief. 
A horrible case, illustrating a genuine problem of America — 
that of juvenile crime — came also within my own knowledge. 
Two boys had a row and one knocked off the cap of the other, 
whereupon the insulted one went home, took his father's gun, 
and lay in wait for his enemy, finally taking deliberate aim 
through a window and shooting him dead. 

It is, perhaps, a little unfair to include these stories in so 
brief an account of the Southern States as I saw them, but 
naturally the incidents were of a character to impress them- 
selves on one's mind. Let me tell one of a less serious char- 
acter. A briefless young. barrister in a Western town was or- 
dered by the Court to take the defence of a prisoner — a thief 
caught red-handed in the act. "What can I do for him, Jedge ?" 
he queried. "You done caught him in the act." "Do the best 
you can for him, Bob," was the answer. The young advocate 
asked and obtained permission to confer with his client, while 
another case was called, and as no convenient place was to 
be found in the court-house they adjourned to the tavern across 
the way. Presently a constable came over to fetch them and 
found the lawyer alone. He shambled over to the Court and 
was confronted by the Judge. "Where's the prisoner ?" "Wal, 
I guess he's acrost the border into Wyoming by now. You 
done told me to do the best I could for him, and seeing the 
tight place he was in I give him the Jedge's horse and he lit 
out!" All the best Americans agree that the enforcement of 
the law and the incorruptible administration of justice are 
questions of the first importance at the present stage of their 
national life, and I am glad to see the prominence given to 
this by Mr. Taft, who will, I hope, be President by the time 
this book appears. A country which has such statesmen as 
Roosevelt and Taft can have no serious difficulty in securing 
vital reforms. 

This mention of American statesmen may be my excuse for 
introducing some of those I have known. In London I met 
Mr. Bayard, the United States Minister, who was worthy of 
his name. At the Embassy, later on, I also met Mr. John Hay, 
with whom I became somewhat intimately acquainted, as our 
tastes were similar. I have a number of kind letters from him 



A VISIT TO THE UNITED STATES 133 

about my books. In manner and appearance he was cosmo- 
politan, a slender, dapper, dark-bearded man, with a quiet 
voice. His literary ability was quite above the average, though 
the quiet distinction of his prose style did not attract the sen- 
sational notice which constitutes fame nowadays. He had a 
real taste for poetry which has descended to one of his daugh- 
ters. His career was really extraordinary. He began as a 
lawyer, fought in the Civil War, and became assistant adju- 
tant-general and brevet-colonel. For five years he was edi- 
torial writer on the New York Tribune and acted for the editor, 
Mr. Whitelaw Reid (who succeeded Hoi ace Greeley in 1872) 
when the latter was away. He was secretary and intimate 
friend of Lincoln, then went into diplomacy, and was at the 
Paris and Vienna Legations, after which he became first As- 
sistant Secretary of State. In 1897-98 he was Ambassador 
to England, and from that time was Secretary of State to the 
United States. This is the most important post after that of 
the President. Lie held it till his death. The last time I saw 
him was at Washington in 1903, and I remember his remind- 
ing me that he had served under three Presidents who had 
been assassinated — Lincoln, Garfield, and McKinley — "Rather 
unnerving, if I were a nervous man," he said quietly. In a 
less serious mood, he told my wife of a domestic disaster which 
once befell him and which will earn the sympathy of all bookish 
men. Leaving his library one summer vacation, he gave direc- 
tion to the housemaid to be most careful in her dusting of the 
books. When he returned she pointed out to him with pride 
that she had followed his orders — she had taken them all out 
and re-arranged them, according to ike colour of their 
bindings! 

With Mr. Roosevelt I did not become acquainted until my 
visit to Washington in 1903, although I was known to him 
through my books. After I had published my "Greater Amer- 
ica" he wrote me a most characteristic letter. Having found 
in the first few pages some statement he wished to discuss, he 
did not wait to finish the book but dashed off a letter at once. 
He very kindly wrote again later and said he was delighted 
with "Greater America," "though you have not got the thing 
quite right about education in the Philippines. I wish, if you 
get to this side again, you would see Secretary Taft." He also 



134 DAN TO BEERSHEBA 

said : "I shall go over some of your views on the Philippines 
with Secretary Taft." 

My wife has two stories of the White House which shall be 
included here. The first relates to a concert given by the 
President and Mrs. Roosevelt in the pretty, newly-decorated 
ball-room. Little gilt chairs were placed for the guests, and 
these were well filled, except one row in front reserved for per- 
formers. The President came in a little late, and glancing 
round took one of these chairs. An attendant bustled up to 
him and whispered something, when he immediately jumped 
up and apologetically transferred himself to a back seat. The 
Senator who was next my wife said to her,. "You see how truly 
democratic we are. We don't even allow our President to 
think he can sit where he likes at his own party !" The other 
story concerns a curious coincidence. At a reception at the 
White House a lady in black came up to my wife and asked 
her, "Did I hear your name announced just now as Mrs. So- 
and-so?" "No," replied my wife, "I am Mrs. Archibald Col- 
quhoun." "And I," said the lady, "am Mrs. Archibald Forbes." 
The coincidence was the more strange because the two hus- 
bands had both been special correspondents and had known 
each other well. Mrs. Archibald Forbes was a widow by this 
time, and (another coincidence) she was a daughter of Major- 
General M. C. Meiggs, U.S.A., and therefore belonged to the 
family of the celebrated engineer whose grandchildren are 
friends of ours. In the chat which followed Mrs. Forbes told 
my wife an amusing experience of hers when she went to 
Scotland as a bride. Americans were not so well known in 
Scottish society at that time and she was regarded as a new 
specimen. Her more unsophisticated relations half expected 
her to have a red skin and wear feathers on her head! At a 
dinner-party given in her honour she overheard them congrat- 
ulating themselves that she apparently was quite civilised and 
had perfect table manners ! 

I have had unusual opportunities for studying Mr. Taft, 
having spent some six weeks in the Philippines with him, and 
though this belongs, of course, to a period subsequent to the 
point fixed upon as a stopping-place in this book, the special 
interest attaching to this big American at this time may excuse 
my saying a few words about him here. The circumstances 
of our meeting belong to "another story." "Bill" Taft, as I 



A VISIT TO THE UNITED STATES 135 

see the journalists are beginning to call him — in his family 
circle I never heard the name used, but then no one but a jour- 
nalist ever called Mr. Roosevelt "Teddy'' — first loomed upon 
us in the sweltering heat of a tropical noon as the biggest, red- 
dest, hottest and best-tempered man we had ever seen. This 
impression was never effaced. I hope to have an opportunity 
of seeing him with the background of the White House, which 
under the Roosevelt regime has become a decent though by 
no means imposing residence for the First Magistrate of so 
great a country as the United States. But I shall always re- 
member Mr. Taft with a background of sapphire sky and sea — 
blindingly bright — sitting in a cane chair with a folding table 
in front of him, a secretary on one side and Judge Luke 
Wright on the other. All are in white, and everyone's collar 
his wilted. Perspiration streams down the pale cheek of the 
secretary and the red cheek of Mr. Taft, as he alternately 
mops and fans himself and dictates letters. At intervals the 
judge calls him in to discuss some knotty point in the legal 
code they are drawing up, but as if these two occupations are 
not enough at one time, Mr. Taft pauses every now and then 
to shoot a joke over his shoulder at a group of ladies lying 
flat in long chairs a few yards off. "Now then! Now then! 
Mrs. Calhoon, I can't have any treason to the United States 
talked aboard this boat — oh, yes, I heard you all right!" On 
this particular boat it may be mentioned here, there were some 
of the heaviest men I have known — I was a lightweight at 
fourteen stone! The Filipinos were much impressed by our 
size. "Are all Americans like that?" they asked with awe. 

The exertions of which Mr. Taft is capable in his voracity 
for work were the more remarkable in the climate of the Phil- 
ippines, which saps the energy of most people, especially when 
one considers his size, which must have made the heat more 
oppressive. He will not have much time for idleness in the 
White House. One evening I remember when Mr. Roosevelt 
came in to his private room at nearly 11 p. m. to have the chat 
for which I was waiting by appointment, he threw himself 
down in a chair and said the President was the hardest-worked 
man in America! "He works hard too," he said, nodding 
laughingly at a picture of the Emperor William. "But, Lord ! 
nothing like me!" Another quality for which Mr. Taft will* 
find abundant use is the sweetness of his temper and genial 



136 DAN TO BEERSHEBA 

tact. I have seen him worried by the little details of organisa- 
tion which ought to have been spared him, but which the demo- 
cratic system demanded that he should personally attend to, 
and his good humour and patience were invariable. A more 
attractive personality it would be hard to find. There is some- 
thing clean and straight and genuine about him, and he is as 
devoid of vanity or smallness of any kind as he is incapable 
of deceit. Withal he is genuinely American, with the buoy- 
ancy and idealism of the best type of his race, mixed with the 
practical common sense and love of work which mark a more 
common and perhaps less attractive type. The combination 
is one of which any country might be proud. This is a per- 
sonal book, so I will leave politics alone, otherwise I should 
be tempted into some forecasts as to Mr. Taft's development 
as a statesman. 

It has been mentioned that I put my savings into American 
real estate. It was just at the end of my first visit to the States 
that I accomplished this stroke of genius. I was told a boom 
was coming to the South, and I hastened to rake my shekels 
together and invest them in a fruit plantation. The other day 
I heard a Canadian retrieve himself very neatly after a faux 
pas. He had been talking very amiably to a lady at a public 
dinner whose name he had not caught when they were intro- 
duced. Presently a speech was made referring to a lady jour- 
nalist who was their guest that night. "Who is this woman?" 
he inquired of his neighbour. "Why, you're talking to her!" 
was the reply. For a moment he was out of countenance, 
then he said : "I reckon a man must make a fool of himself 
at least once in his life — and my time has come !" Well, "my 
time" had certainly come ! Hardly had I completed the invest- 
ment of all my savings when down went the market. I heard 
the news when just sailing for home, and immediately on my 
arrival, being determined not to repeat my experience with 
"Chartereds," and be squeezed out just before the property 
went up in value again, I raked some more money together 
somehow, borrowed on an insurance and sent out another 
thousand or so to be dropped into the bottomless pit! The 
crisis was one of the most severe ever experienced in the 
United States, and the depression lasted long enough to make 
it impossible to keep my plantation going. 

Luckily for me I was able, at this juncture, to retire, 



A VISIT TO THE UNITED STATES 137 

drawing a special pension from the Government of India, 
so that my living was at least secure, but I had crippled 
myself severely by my foolish investment, and found it neces- 
sary, for the first time, to take inexpensive rooms, using my 
club as an address. I descended from Bryanston Street 
or St. James' to Camden Town! Throughout life I have 
proved that what seems like a misfortune frequently turns out 
a blessing. In this case I found in the landlady of my rooms 
one of the best and most devoted of women, and from this 
time to the date of my marriage my home in England was 
always made under her roof, though I was not so comfortable 
in her second and more pretentious establishment as in my 
old "digs." She looked after me with care and even, I think, 
affection, and I recall her memory with gratitude. 

A small lecturing tour was now undertaken by me, always 
a most exhausting business but lucrative if well managed. 
When one thinks of the number of good men killed by the 
fatigues of lecturing, especially in America, one is glad to 
have escaped. To give a few instances in my own memory — 
Charles Dickens, Max O'Rell, Ian Maclaren — all fell victims 
to the overstrain and fatigue of lecture work. It is not so 
much the actual lecturing as the travelling between and the 
well-meant but fatal kindness included under the term "hos- 
pitality." Mark Twain was once asked what his charges 
would be to deliver a lecture "out West." He wired, "Lec- 
ture $200. if with hospitality $400." Colonel Pond, the great 
American lecture agent, with whom I was once in communica- 
tion, told me that English lecturers as a rule did not make 
much of a success in the United States, but that Max O'Rell 
was the biggest "draw" that he had ever handled. I knew this 
clever and amusing man, and from his lips got the story of a 
tu quoque which is hard to beat. He was touring in Australia 
at the same time as an actor-manager with a Shakespearean 
repertory, and at a dinner to which both were invited, the latter 
called across the table to him, "D'ye know, M. Blouet. I went 
to see your show the other night and I never laughed once !" 
"How curious," replied "Max" swiftly; "I went to see your 
Hamlet last night and laughed the whole time!" Mme. 
Blouet has told me that the enthusiasm of the American 
ladies after her husband's lectures was beyond all bounds. One 
of them rushed up to her and said: "Madame Blouay, your 



138 DAN TO BEERSHEBA 

husband is just the loveliest thing that ever happened!" 
Personally I thought Blouet inimitable — the very best lec- 
turer of his genre I ever heard. His premature death was 
most regrettable. 

My own experience of a lecture tour ended disastrously. 
After visiting several of the large manufacturing cities, where 
addresses were delivered to geographical or other societies, 
I was due at Edinburgh to be present at a party given by a 
married sister there. The preceding night, after my lecture, 
I spent at a hotel in Manchester, and woke up feeling cold 
and miserable but caught the train and arrived at my sister's 
house. I felt feverish and had some difficulty in keeping up 
during the evening, but next morning the doctor, who was sent 
for, declared it was nothing much. I had an overpowering 
desire to get back to my own place — the sick animal's instinct 
to crawl to his hole — and I took the express to London, 
arrived at my rooms in a state of collapse, and tumbled into 
bed. I never left that bed for five months, going through a 
most severe attack of rheumatic fever. My kind landlady did 
all in her power for me, and my half-brother and an old 
friend, Archie Constable, also came to me, but for a great 
part of the time I was unconscious or delirious. It has been 
mentioned that I was practically saved by an old doctor 
friend from Rangoon, who came and brought a great specialist 
on rheumatic fever. The latter prescribed drastic but effec- 
tive treatment. He afterwards told me he had seldom seen 
a more severe case. 

As soon as I was strong again I had to face a great tangle 
in my affairs, brought about by more than a year's inactivity 
and heavy expenses on the top of all my losses in America. 
How I set about getting work again I will show in the next 
chapter. 



CHAPTER XIV 

IN CENTRAL AMERICA 

'The ruling passion" with me — the subject of communica- 
tions — had drawn my attention while in the United States 
to the Canal question, and I had discussed it at Washington 
and elsewhere with many people who were well up in the sub- 
ject. This fact brought me, indirectly, into touch with a 
group of men in London who desired more information about 
it, as they contemplated participating in the construction. 
Of course, at this time it was thought that the Canal would 
be made by a private company but would certainly be owned 
internationally. Partly with a view to "prospecting" for these 
people and partly on my own account I determined to visit 
Central America and go into the Canal question as thoroughly 
as I could on the spot. I therefore took a passage by the 
Royal Mail Steamship Line for Colon and arrived there after 
a very pleasant voyage, during which I touched at several 
of the West Indian islands and made my first acquaintance 
with those jewels of the Caribbean. 

Colon, the Atlantic terminus of the Panama Canal, was 
very different in those days to what it is now. The dreaded 
mosquito had not yet been grappled with, indeed, we were 
not aware of his deadly character, and bore his stings with 
as much equanimity as we could muster. Fever was rampant, 
and the West Indian negroes who had been imported for the 
Canal work were no more exempt than the whites. When I 
arrived, about five hundred men were being kept at work in 
order that the French concession under the new company 
might not lapse, and the machinery and plant were maintained 
in fairly good order. I travelled over the route and studied 
numbers of estimates, reports and monographs on the sub- 
ject, with the result that I was by no means convinced of 

i39 



140 DAN TO BEERSHEBA 

the feasibility of the Canal under the conditions then existing. 
The estimate made by me for completing the work was not 
less than forty millions sterling, a sum which seemed too 
large to allow of the Canal being built under private auspices. 
The scheme which is now being carried out was originally 
estimated at twenty-eight millions but has already been altered 
so as to considerably increase the amount. Judging from the 
present rate of expenditure, and allowing for contingencies 
not adequately provided for, I do not think the ultimate cost 
of the Canal will fall short of the sum originally laid down 
by me. I was then, moreover, of the opinion that the factor 
of the greatest uncertainty was the Chagres River, ordinarily 
a quiet stream but liable to be swelled suddenly into a tor- 
rential flood. Having seen something of tropical rivers in 
connection with engineering problems in other countries I was 
anxious to form my own estimate of the Chagres, and the 
result was a conviction that that river presents difficulties 
for which we have no adequate experience to guide us in 
circumventing it. This judgment remains true to this day. 
Constant alterations have been made in the Canal scheme 
as adopted by the United States Government with a view to 
strengthening the works by which the Chagres is to be con- 
trolled, but these works must be of an experimental character, 
and the success of the Canal depends on the Chagres behaving 
as it is expected to after the works are finished. The largest 
possible margin will of course be allowed for accident. 

My intention had been to return from my inspection to 
Colon and take a steamer thence up the coast to Greytown, 
but finding no steamer available I decided to present a letter 
of introduction, given me by Major (later General) Ludlow, 
Military Attache to the United States Embassy in London, 
to Robley Evans, then with a portion of the White Squadron 
which was off Colon. "Fighting Bob" Evans received me 
very kindly and was quite willing to give me a passage up 
the coast as the squadron was just starting, but the admiral, 
a confirmed Anglophobe, when the request was preferred to 
him, swore he would have "no d — d Times correspondent on 
his ships." It must be explained that the affair of the Mosquito 
Coast (see p. 331) was then on the tapis, and that the English 
were not popular in Central America. Rather than wait a 
couple of weeks in Colon I crossed the isthmus to Panama 



IN CENTRAL AMERICA 141 

and took a passage from there up the Pacific coast to the 
Nicaraguan port Corinto, but this disarrangement in my plans 
was a serious inconvenience to me and an extra expense for 
which provision had not been made. I was determined not 
to miss any part of my programme, however, so took a pas- 
sage at the lowest rate on the Pacific boat — it practically 
amounted to a deck passage. I had not the ready cash for 
anything more, unless I crippled myself unduly before arriv- 
ing in Nicaragua, where I was most anxious to move about 
freely and stay some time. The agent of the boat offered 
to give me a cabin on trust, saying the money could be sent 
later, and on my refusal, being determined to economise, 
he actually gave me a cabin to myself and said I could arrange 
my own messing. I provided myself with some stores and 
was quite prepared to "see it out," but even here the kindness 
of strangers pursued me, for an American gentleman travelling 
first class begged me to join their meals as his guest, offered 
me the passage-money as a loan, and when both kind offers 
were refused, was quite put out. The little discomfort was, 
of course, nothing to an old campaigner like myself and I 
much preferred the saving it enabled me to effect, but I was 
certainly inconvenienced by the fact that one cannot step out 
of the usual rut without attracting attention. At a trifling 
cost I messed with the engineers, whose society was perfectly 
congenial and from whom a lot of information was picked up. 
Since this journey I have visited many other Spanish- 
American countries and towns, and the likeness of one to 
another and of all to their European prototypes is quite 
remarkable. The Spaniards have set an unmistakable seal 
upon lands they conquered while the British have not Briticised 
any tropical country below the surface. They adopt a style 
of architecture and a mode of life modelled on that of the 
natives, but Spain built solidly, great stone cathedrals, thick 
wailed houses with patios, massive fortifications, wide plazas 
with ornate fountains, stately presidios, strong and loathsome 
prisons. No bamboo huts and bungalows for them ! More- 
over, they imposed their religion and civilisation wherever 
they went. The cities of Spanish America have consequently 
none of the temporary makeshift appearance one finds in other 
settlements of Europeans on alien soil. The Spanish tempera- 
ment, with its love of art and poetry, has stood the shock 



i 4 2 DAN TO BEERSHEBA 

of race admixture. The Spanish-American has the faults 
of his European forbear with others added, but he has what 
painters call "quality" — there is originality in him, stuffing 
in him. He may do great things yet, because with all his 
faults he has ideals and the great tradition of his Latin blood 
is not forgotten. But, while this is true of the Latin-Ameri- 
can peoples as a whole, and especially of such as the Chilians 
or Brazilians, it must be confessed that the worst specimens 
of the breed are to be found in the Panama isthmus. 

The ways of love-making amused me much. Strictly speak- 
ing, in accordance with the unwritten laws of Spanish Central 
America, the lover is absolutely forbidden to enter the house 
of his inamorata. Even when, prior to his amatory inclina- 
tion becoming evident, he happens to be an intimate of the 
family, all friendship ceases the moment it is known that he 
is haaendo el oso ("playing the bear") as they say, to one of 
the young ladies. Seeing that the unfortunate Romeo has to 
carry on his courtship in the most stealthy manner possible, 
the only opportunity of speaking with his lady-love being 
through the reja of the window, where he is to be found night 
after night haunting the iron railings with a pertinacity that 
would do credit to a Yankee drummer, the phrase seems 
somewhat of a misnomer. He certainly never gets a chance 
of hugging. The enmity provoked in the bosoms of the 
young lady's family is really remarkable. He is cut by all 
of them, and must ever be on guard against the sudden ap- 
pearance of his probable future relations on the scene of 
his amorous dalliance. Such, then, are the pains and penal- 
ties of daring to fall in love, and under the circumstances 
the lover ought to be a very unhappy man, but I do not know 
that he is. Questioned on the subject, he will tell you that 
their methods of courtship, with the thrilling excitement to 
be found in stolen interviews, accomplished only by unceas- 
ing intrigue, are infinitely preferable to the tame Anglo- 
American custom, and that he fails to see any attraction in 
being allowed to accompany one's sweetheart when she takes 
her walks abroad or in being constantly in her company. There 
are, of course, exceptions to this rule of courtship among 
the more advanced section of society, when the lover is 
allowed not only to enter the house but to take his seat at the 
side of the young lady: everything he has to say, however, 



IN CENTRAL AMERICA 143 

must be spoken in presence of members of the family, or at 
any rate of the duenna who never for a moment leaves him 
alone and under no circumstances allows herself to be caught 
napping. Notwithstanding all this excessive vigilance, the 
standard of morality is by no means high, as indeed might 
be expected from the training given to men and women (but 
especially the convent education of the latter) and from the 
indolent life invariably led. 

With regard to public amusements, the people are devoted 
to the theatre, but naturally few passable theatrical com- 
panies come to Nicaragua, though now and again a fair 
Mexican travelling troupe is to be found there, playing light 
opera or heavy drama. Like all the peoples of the Latin 
race, the Nicaraguans are passionately fond of music, but 
most of all of light or comic opera. Even if comedy or 
drama be played, ballad and chorus must seemingly be in- 
troduced in some form or another. The "marimba," an instru- 
ment well adapted to the plaintive but melodious native airs, 
is kept at all the tambos (resting stages) on the main high- 
ways where the cartmen and muleteers stop. It is not unusual 
for an unfortunate troupe of actors to be stranded in one of 
the inland towns without the means to move. A friend of 
mine told me that on one occasion he and another man, who 
had witnessed the performance of such a troupe and had 
quite lost their hearts to the young and lovely leading lady, 
collected a handsome subscription which they proposed to lay 
personally on her shrine and thus get another glimpse of 
the goddess. Unfortunately for their illusion they chose the 
morning for their visit, and found the senorita with her stout 
mamma, eating pickled onions en deshabille. Not all the 
languishing of her long brown eyes could prevent them from 
noticing the high-water mark on her neck and, as my friend 
pathetically remarked, they felt they would pay twice the 
monev to get her out of the town ! 

Now and again may be witnessed an inferior bull-fight — 
or perhaps one ought to say bull-baiting, seeing that they are 
not allowed to kill the animal — on which occasion everybody 
turns out ; this pastime, or gambling, alone possessing the 
magic power of making the Nicaraguan lose a little of his 
wonted indifference. They played Audran's "Mascotte" one 
night I visited the Granada theatre, during the performance 



144 DAN TO BEERSHEBA 

of which a topical song, brought very much up to date and 
rounded off with a crushing verse about the British nation 
with reference to the Corinto incident, was introduced with 
startling success. It may be remembered that the occupation 
of Corinto by the British Government for the violent treat- 
ment of her consular representative, for which a fine of 
£5,500 was exacted as "smart money," created great excite- 
ment in Nicaragua. Luckily the impresario was good enough 
to omit several verses which would certainly have exercised 
an unfortunate effect upon the already over-excited people, 
especially the youth of the city, who had been for days parad- 
ing the streets, shouting Que mueran los Ingleses. 

The local journals went delirious, and the Press of the 
United States was inundated by telegraph with exaggerated 
and inflammatory views. I was invited by a Nicaraguan 
paper to retrace my steps: to "return at once by the way I 
had come." The Monroe doctrine was in everyone's mouth. 
Nicaragua's hopes were without doubt centred in the expected 
interference of the United States Government, largly influ- 
enced by what was appearing in the American Press, es- 
pecially certain distorted interpretations of the Monroe doc- 
trine which encouraged the view that territorial aggrandise- 
ment and the control of the inter-oceanic route were the real 
aims of the British. 

The United States Government, and the larger section of 
the whole people too, I believe, took altogether a soberer 
view of the matter, and fully recognised that Britain had 
done nothing in Nicaragua which the United States them- 
selves would not have done under similar circumstances. The 
incident cleared the air, and was useful as a practical exposi- 
tion of the Monroe doctrine and of the obligations of the 
United States towards the various republics of Central 
America, as well as towards the West Indies and South 
America. It was made evident that the position of the United 
States is not that of an involuntary Power whose armed 
force is to be at the beck and call of any American State 
that may find itself in need of aid. 

It is not possible to spend even a short time in a Central 
American republic without seeing something of the peculiar 
political conditions resulting on the adoption, by a people 
ill adapted to work it, of an outward form of republicanism. 



IN CENTRAL AMERICA 145 

Every well-governed Spanish-American republic — and there 
are more than one — owes its prosperity to having found a 
dictator. Nicaragua has not been so fortunate, and is still 
a prey to the political unrest that I noted at the time of my 
first visit. 

On a subsequent occasion I remember, when re-visiting 
Central America, and pottering up the coast in a fruit 
steamer which collected bananas at all the small ports, at 
one place a cheerful American doctor welcomed us in a 
charming bungalow and talked about revolutions. One was 
expected at that moment. "Do they inconvenience you 
much?" we asked. "Wa-al, they do some," he said, reflec- 
tively. "Last time they chose to manoeuvre across my tennis 
court, and as I'd had considerable trouble in getting it in 
order I did raise an objection that time!" 

Revolutions are, however, by no means always bloodless. 
Colombia waged a civil war which so decimated her full- 
grown men that on one occasion when I visited that country 
the merest little boys were enrolled as soldiers. Political 
convictions, moreover, are serious matters ; a man will die 
for them. I met a quiet, sad-eyed little man, one who had 
just come out of Cartagena jail after three years' captivity. 
The dungeons of Cartagena are something to be seen to be 
believed; prisoners have to be supplied with food by their 
friends, and many of them save an expense their families 
can ill afford by dying. My little friend had suffered and 
survived. We asked him what it was all about. "A matter 
of politics," he replied; "I am anti-clerical, and the other 
party came in, so when they sent round a proclamation for 
me to sign and demanded a heavy contribution I refused. 
Then, of course, I must go to prison." "But why not pre- 
tend?" asked an unscrupulous young lady who listened to the 
story — she had seen the dungeons, and she knew that the 
little man had lost most of his property by confiscation as 
well. "Oh, senorita," he replied, "for a man of honour that 
is impossible!" 

My serious studies of the Canal occupied most of my 
time, and on my return home I embodied them in a book 
called "The Key of the Pacific," in which the advantages 
of the Nicaragua route were urged. It would have been 
much longer than the Panama, but I do not think the engineer- 



146 DAN TO BEERSHEBA 

ing difficulties are nearly as great. Among the advantages, 
the chief is the strategic one. On the waters of Lake Nica- 
ragua — the largest body of fresh water between Lake Michigan 
in North America and Lake Titicaca in Peru — could float 
the combined navies of the whole world, and a glance at any 
general map will suffice to show why such vast importance 
has been attached to it in the past by men like David, Nelson, 
Humboldt, and Napoleon III and by the leading American 
statesmen and naval authorities of the present day. Nelson 
realised the importance of the lake when, in helping to put 
into execution Dalling's plan in 1780 (to control the com- 
munication between the Atlantic and the Pacific), he conveyed 
a force of 2,000 men to San Juan de Nicaragua to effect 
the conquest of the country. "In order to give facility 
to the great object of government," he wrote, "I intend to 
possess the great lake of Nicaragua, which I regard as the 
inland Gibraltar of Spanish America." 

It is impossible here to tell the story of the war waged over 
the rival routes, in which my "Key" was a weapon used 
more than once, quoted in the Senate, extracts embodied 
in Government reports, and so forth. The forces which had 
opposed both canals, for reasons of self-interest, were finally 
worsted in the fight, but political conditions decided in favour 
of the route by Panama. The question was this: Could 
the United States with its expansionist policy, of which Presi- 
dent Roosevelt became the protagonist, permit the Canal to 
be owned, even partly, by another nation? The question 
was answered in the negative and, the United States having 
shouldered the burden with the acquiescence of the other 
Powers, one great difficulty was eliminated. The question 
of expense was no longer of paramount importance, and an 
expenditure of thirty or more millions sterling could be faced 
without blinking. This at once removed an objection to 
Panama, and France was bought out. The second difficulty 
which had occurred to me — that of carrying out such vast 
works in a foreign territory — was overcome by Mr. Roose- 
velt in a fashion which could hardly have been anticipated 
in 1894. In short, all objections to Panama, including the 
malarial mosquito, have been successfully eliminated save one 
— the Chagres River. The Culebra cut, which seemed to the 
engineering science of 1894 an enormous obstacle, is now 



IN CENTRAL AMERICA 147 

being rapidly disposed of, but the river itself still puzzles 
the experts, who find it hard to decide where and how it is 
to be successfully dammed and made to play the game. A 
factor which is undeterminable in either route is the pos- 
sibility of seismic disturbance, and in view of this I have 
always been in favour of the fewest possible artificial works, 
and these as strong as engineering skill can make them. With 
the energy the United States are now putting into the work, 
the Canal — barring accidents — should be open in time for 
me to go through it. 

On my way home I stopped at Trinidad and met there 
a former Times correspondent in the governor, Sir Napier 
Broome, and his wife, who as Lady Barker had been in 
New Zealand and South Africa and had written several 
interesting books and sketches of social life. I remember 
her as an excellent talker and with considerable powers of 
repartree. On one occasion she was visiting an American 
country house, on the invitation of a New York lady of the 
type which just then was beginning to play at having a 
^'country home" without much idea of the game. Lady 
Broome was dressed with great simplicity — probably she looked 
dowdy. She had expected an afternoon visit to a sort of 
farmhouse and a scramble about on the hills. She found a 
cottage ornee and all the ladies in full toilettes. Her hostess, 
in the course of a discussion as to their respective countries, 
said, "You don't mind my saying it, I hope, but English 
women don't know how to dress !" "Quite so," said Lady 
Broome sweetly, "but you will also allow, I am sure" — with 
a sly glance round the room — "that American women don't 
know ivhen to dress !" On another occasion she was talking 
with the admiral of a foreign squadron which put in at 
Trinidad. He was bellicose and had not much tact. "If we 
did have a brush with your ships," he began. "Well," said 
Lady Broome, "what then?" He laughed. "I should be tow- 
ing that tub" — pointing to the English flagship — "into one of 
your ports!" "Indeed," said Lady Broome, "you compliment 
neither yourself nor us. I should have expected you to reply 
that both ships would be sunk or disabled!" It was very 
pretty, and the reproof, conveyed without any disparagement 
of his own prowess, struck me as especially neat. 

Home again — and with plenty of fresh material for work. 



148 DAN TO BEERSHEBA 

I was launched by "The Key of the Pacific" on the public 
of America as well as of my own country as an author, and 
from this time forward I have never been without either a 
commission or scheme for a fresh book. My work for re- 
views on both sides of the Atlantic increased steadily, and about 
this time I formed a connection with the Morning Post which 
continues unbroken to this day. The Times, to which I had 
hitherto contributed, had now a very strong staff to deal with 
Eastern affairs, including Mr. Valentine Chirol and soon after 
my friend Dr. Morrison, the best informed correspondent any 
paper ever had in the Far East. As the Far Eastern question 
was then becoming prominent I returned to it in the columns 
of the Morning Post, and since then I have never written for 
any other daily paper, except an occasional book review for the 
Daily Chronicle before it became half price. 

At this point, my return from America and my definite em- 
barkation upon the sea of literature and journalism, I must 
close — for the present, at all events — the record of work and 
travel in four continents. The work has been good to do and 
it is good to remember. Some of it I hope has been useful, 
none was purposeless. Such retrospects are not without a 
melancholy side, for one looks back on lost comrades and lost 
causes, but for my own part I find the present too absorbing 
to have time to regret the past. I have said very little in these 
pages about my politics, because for the best part of my life 
I was not able to identify myself with any party, and in our 
country politics without party are hardly intelligible. Having 
spent comparatively so short a time in England I have never 
followed the more localised questions which influence home 
politics. It has been, on the contrary, a bitter experience to 
find the interests of whole communities of British overseas 
subordinated to some affair of the parish pump. But the parish 
pump is of vital importance to the parish, and by degrees I 
have come to realise that it is not a fault in our people but 
in the system, and even so the system is the best that has yet 
been devised by man so long as it is not stereotyped. It must 
progress. I hope that it may progress in the direction of an 
Empire which will be something more than a heterogeneous 
collection of "colonies," "dependencies," and "independencies" 
— we want the last term — bound together but not united. In 



IN CENTRAL AMERICA 149 

short, I am a convinced and rabid Imperialist, and my chief 
ambition is that the work I have been able to do, in helping 
to educate my countrymen as to little known regions and in 
attempting to grapple with world problems, has been a con- 
tribution, however humble, towards the knowledge that is 
power and without which we cannot build our Empire strong 
and safe. With this end in view I have written always with- 
out fear or favour. 

Before closing this book I will briefly recapitulate my prin- 
cipal doings since 1895. In the following year I went out 
to China on a mission from the Hong Kong and Shanghai 
Bank, in company with Mr. Detring who represented a power- 
ful group of German banks. This business kept me in China 
for a year, and I had a house at Peking and got a consider- 
able insight into things Chinese. My mission took me into 
the region of high politics, and on my return home I published 
"China in Transformation" and did a good deal of speaking 
in connection with affairs in the Far East. I ought to mention 
that I came home via Canada and spent some time there en 
route. In 1897 I was commissioned by Messrs. Harper and 
went out across Siberia by the railway to Irkutsk (then the 
terminus) and thence across the Gobi desert by camel to 
Peking. From Peking I made my way south, up the Yangtze, 
and out via Yunnan to Tongking. Returning via Australasia 
I wrote "The Overland to China/' and a smaller book, "Russia 
against India." I got married in a brief interval, the time 
between renewing acquaintance with the lady and our wedding 
being exactly six months ! We then went to Spain and Mo- 
rocco, and in the autumn of the same year (1900) departed for 
an extended journey in the Pacific, in which we visited the 
Dutch East Indies, Borneo, the Philippines (still in a state of 
war), the China coast, Japan and Korea, and returned by the 
Siberian railway. The year 1902 saw the publication of "The 
Mastery of the Pacific" and an illustrated book from my wife's 
pen called "Two on their Travels." The autumn of that year 
was spent in the West Indies and Central America, and we 
then went through the States and revisited Canada, the result 
being "Greater America," which appeared in 1904. Next 
autumn and winter was spent in South Africa, visiting the 
German West Coast on the way, travelling in every colony and 
revisiting Rhodesia and the Victoria Falls, and finally return- 



ISO DAN TO BEERSHEBA 

ing home in early summer by the East Coast. The next spring 
saw the publication of "The Africanderland," and that year 
(1906) we devoted to a study of European politics and to 
travel in Austra-Hungary and the Near East, which resulted 
in "The Whirlpool of Europe," published in 1907. Through- 
out this period I contributed frequently to the Morning Post 
and on occasion acted as special correspondent to that jour- 
nal, wrote articles for the Quarterly, Fortnightly, North 
American Reviezv, and other periodicals, and read papers be- 
fore the Royal Colonial Institute, Society of Arts, Royal 
United Service Institute, and other Associations in London 
and the provinces. If this catalogue of work done in the last 
eight years appears a heavy one, it must be remembered that 
it is the output of two people working in collaboration, and 
working very hard — otherwise it could never have been ac- 
complished. I have used the past tense in speaking of my 
work but, as a matter of fact, my literary activity continues 
unabated, and makes it difficult for us to devote as much time 
to travelling as heretofore. Nevertheless we have plans for 
future journeys as fascinating as those already accomplished. 

This brief outline leaves out of account smaller journeys 
taken for pleasure only, but the reader can imagine that the 
years have been full ones, and that with the widening horizon 
life becomes more and more interesting. Heartily can I en- 
dorse the "Sentimental Traveller" when he says, in the words 
chosen for the motto of this book: 

"I pity the man who can travel from Dan to Beersheba and 
cry ' 'tis all barren' ; and so it is, and so is all the world, to him 
who will not cultivate the fruits it offers." 



OCT 19 1900 



